Poultry roaming around our farm is a common sight.
Over the years there have been ducks, geese, chickens and guineas. Of all the poultry, guineas by far exhibit the strangest behavior.
They scamper silently from location to location. Frequently they come up behind you in the yard or in the barn and utter a noise that I can only describe as a well pump in need of oil. If you’re not prepared, the high-pitch squawks and hiccups scare you out of your shoes.
While they are good at scaring people, guineas are not very good at hatching their chicks. Very few of the guinea females will sit on a nest for the 28 days required for hatching. Chickens are, by far, better suited as incubators.
I recently had a front-row seat as one of the white laying chickens sat on a dozen guinea eggs for one 28-day period only to have no chicks hatch.
The hen made a nest behind the large floor fan in the horse barn, out of the way of the cats and any other creatures who venture through the barn.
When she was sitting, she was all business and didn’t move from the nest except for an occasional drink of water.
The second batch of eggs yielded five guinea chicks so small they looked like one-inch puffballs on sticks. That white hen would protectively gather the chicks under her with only 10 little legs visible under her feathered body.
The hen proved to be a good mom.
She would lead those guinea chicks on day trips between the horse and cattle barns, scratching at the ground and showing her “children” how to feed themselves. Each night she would bring her brood back to the horse barn, tucking them under her as she sat behind the fan.
I also found she was pretty protective of those chicks.
One evening, when a barn cat tried to make an entree out of one of the chicks, a fight between the hen and the cat rivaled any WWF match. Feathers flew, wings pummeled the cat with a flurry before the attacker suddenly ran away.
I admit I laughed at the fight. I’m glad it wasn’t my foot (which she often pecked as I walked too close to her chicks).
The developing cornfield south of the barns seemed to be a favorite place for the hen to search for food – until she became food for something that hides in the cornfield.
One morning, just hours after I saw the hen and chicks walking along the cornfield’s edge, a large area of white feathers covered the ground, more than what was lost when the hen fought the cat.
I suspected the worst, which was confirmed when the white hen didn’t return to the nest in the barn.
Fortunately, the white hen’s legacy does live on.
Those five guinea chicks are now mothered by a young guinea hen who often strolled nearby while the chicken had the chicks out on a walk. They frequently scamper around the farm and are developing the telltale “squeeky pump” noises that only a poultry mother can love.