During this time, sadly, the "living closer to nature" part of rural life reared its head, and took off our guinea Sam's head...Yep, Monkey1 found the carcass, sans head, stuffed under the tongue of the cargo trailer before noon one day. My first thought was a raccoon got him. Coons are known for indiscriminate killing of chickens if they get into a coop, and apart from the head and neck being gone, there was no feeding on the guinea. But, there is also a pack of feral cats in the woods behind us. So it might have been them, though I would have expected them to feed on the guinea.
To try to get an idea of what critter did the fowl (HA!) deed, I wandered off to Walmart and bought a small inexpensive game camera. So far, it has only caught pics of us wandering around the tree line, and the septic sprayers kicking on. That is, until this morning...
Wow! He looks like Swiper from Dora the Explorer! We have coyotes here too, and they're usually responsible for the disappearance of toy dogs and other small creatures. Are you going to fence your birds in at night?
ReplyDeleteThe hens have a secure run and coop, but the guineas were allowed to free range 100%. They didn't play nice with the chickens...
ReplyDeleteI knew someone who had guineas mixed in with her chickens. She said they liked to roost in the trees at night! At least coyotes can't climb trees (although the raccoons do, but most of them are so fat from raiding the garbage that they just waddle about at night)...
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