Settling In

It appears that everyone is settling into their new accommodations now.  The guineas seem to be OK with their ghetto coop, and the chickens like their condo.  The dogs (both ours and the neighbor's yellow lab) seem less and less interested in the chickens and guineas whenever they are out in the run.

Fenix checking out the guineas.

I added straw into the run where it was dirt to hopefully keep the mud down a bit.  I also put some on the ramps for the coops in the hopes that it would give them a little traction to get up and down.  Not sure it worked too well because the birds picked it all off the ramp and had no problems going in and out.

The only issue I have been having now is when I open both the chicken coop and guinea coop doors at the same time.  After a little while, everyone ends up in the chicken coop.  Apparently the guineas like to go uptown and hang out in the nice digs.  The chickens don't seem to mind right now, but once everyone gets a little bigger, it is going to be a tighter fit in there.

Two Barred Rocks and an Ameraucana venturing out of the coop.

The only chickens that have been adventurous enough to go outside the coop are the Barred Rocks and Ameraucanas.  The Barred Rock are the friendliest and will come right up to us and let us hold them.  The rest are a bit shy, so we need to pick them up more and get them used to us touching them.

As soon as the guineas get bigger, I think they will be able to defend themselves from the dogs.  Hopefully by then everyone will be used to each other and it won't be a big deal, otherwise we may be fertilizing our yard with feathers once the dogs are done with them.

In case you were wondering, we never did catch the seventh guinea.  We have been letting the remaining six loose in the run every day hoping that they will make some noise and attract their brother back to the pen, but we haven't seen or heard from him.  We may have chased him into the next county and is now living happily on some other farm.  Unless we see him again, we are going to stick with that story.  It makes for a happier ending!