A rural woman in Illinois called today, asking for help persuading her neighbors to be more tolerant of her guineas. She started with 12 birds, in addition to her chickens, for a project for her 14-year-old son. That small flock is reduced to six. Pictured at left is a Helmeted Guineafowl from the Encyclopedia Brittanica.The neighbors, who live on their property across the street only part-time, object so strongly to the guineafowl that they have threatened to shoot them. They have run over several with their car.
The birds stay close to home most of the time, but when the neighbors arrive, they stray across the road to visit. Guineas are naturally curious and retain much of their wild nature.
I suggested that she build a roomy chicken tractor for them, with perches, to allow them some of the freedom of behavior that they crave while keeping them away from the neighbors and out of harm's way.
These neighbors have hardened their hearts against these lovely and amusing birds. All suggestions are welcome.
Read more about Guineafowl at http://www.feathersite.com/Poultry/Guineas/BRKGuineas.html.
4 comments:
This is a tough situation. Once the neighbors are against them, it's hard to change their minds. It seems they really have it in for the Guineas. I wish I had a solution to the problem but these people sound unreasonable. There must be some sort of compromise that all parties can agree upon. The tractor sounds like a good idea. Maybe they can free-range while the neighbors are gone then go into the tractor when they come home.
These human relations situations are always the most difficult. It's so unfortunate when people move to the country and then object to the differences of rural life. I plan to stay in touch with her and hope to be able to tell a success story some day.
I got a solution....the neighbors can give me their home and I'll move in to it and then they won't have to worry about some really cool lookin' critters comin' over to say HI!
Idiots...they've got no idea how lucky they are that if their only so-called problem is some friendly animals. grrrrr
This actually gives me a new topic for one of my blogs!! *giggle*
Where in Illinois are you ? It would be most upsetting to me if I had neighbors that would purposely run over any animal or bird. (I would guess your neighbors are "evil".) We have a Guineafowl that just seemed to appear here at Argonne National Laboratory in Lemont, Illinois.
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