Broody Guinea Update - Nest Raided

Our broody guinea hen is still gettin' broody. She's entering her fourth week, which should be the final week. Luckily, she chose a nice shady spot because she also chose the middle of  heat-wave to sit on those eggs.

About a week ago I noticed her off the nest looking down at the nest perplexedly. She was kind of circling the eggs and bobbing her head up and down. I walked over to see what was up and she quickly sat on it. Later that day she was off the eggs eating so Sweetbreads went to look and lo and behold only nine eggs remained. Previously, there were 23 plus one giant turkey egg that we snuck under her. Now 14 eggs were missing and the turkey egg was gone too. I imagine there's a bloated snake out there somehwere. No eggshells in sight, something made off with 'em.

The nest as it stands todayNest prior to egg raid

Wednesday or Thursday she should hopefully hatch out the remainder, assuming whatever ate the others doesn't come back for seconds...

 

Wild Turkey Egg Snack


Sophie, the culprit

We milk the goats twice per day. Once around 7am and once around 7pm. They like consistency and if you can get the milkings twelve hours apart that tends to work best. Typically, when we go out to get the goats Sophie and Sheba will greet us at some point along the way. They hear the gate rattle and if they're not busy doing something else they'll come up and walk with us.

On the weekends I'll usually join Sweetbreads since I don't always get to join during the week. On Sunday morning it was business as usual. Sophie and Sheba joined in for the walks. However, on the evening walk Sophie and Sheba were lagging behind. I didn't know why. It made me worry. Were they sick? Were they dehydrated? Did they have lyme disease? So many thoughts run through our heads these days at even the faintest sign of something abnormal. Being observant is critical. 

 

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Guinea Gettin' Broody


Guinea hen gettin' broody with it

One of our guinea hens is gettin' broody these days. Actually, she’s the only adult guinea hen we have right now. For the past few days she’s been sitting on about 20 eggs tucked away in a strip of trees and vines.

For a while she was laying her eggs in the salvaged-barn chicken coop we built. We always left one or two eggs in there so she would keep laying in that spot and we could eat her eggs. Guinea eggs are pretty tasty. Very rich, lots of yolk.

One day a few weeks ago she figured out our game and said to hell with laying eggs in the coop. She was gonna find another spot. After all, her and Guinea Cent wanted to start a family. That’s cool with us, so we didn’t bother to hunt down her nesting spot. Eventually we figured she’d get broody and we’d see where she’d been hiding them.

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