Tuesday, March 21, 2017

Undocumented Immigrants

Last Thursday I had a few undocumented immigrants sneak onto my farm. I offered them sanctuary, but probably due fear of being deported if discovered, they moved on. Perhaps looking for a better place to live unnoticed? 

What the heck am I talking about?    ....  Guinea hens! 


Above, hiding in the shadows, I spied three vigilant Guinea hens sneaking up the road. On edge and leery of my truck, I slowly drove by them. In the distance you can see my entrance gate. Pulling through, I left it open as an invitation to the birds. 


Hours went by and I forgot about them until I heard a racket right outside my front door. I caught one of our farm cats, Crookshank (above), heading over to check out the intruders. The cat caused the G hens to spook and break out into a loud racket. If you've ever heard a Guinea hen, you know how loud that can be. And it's quite a distinctive alarm noise. In fact, I'd love to have it as my phone's ringtone. It surely would turn heads in a crowd, don't ya think? 

Ok, now there's four birds. I was quite surprised to see that they came all the way up to the house. I offered them birdseed, but they weren't impressed. I threw about some torn up bread, which they also said "no thank you" to. So I let them be to see what would develop. 

That night they slept in a tree by the chicken pen. In the morning before I left for Maui for three days, I saw a group of FIVE Guinea hens cruising around the front pasture area. I bid them goodbye as I left and wished them luck, but first left numerous piles of birdseed here and there. 

I was hoping they would stay. I hadn't the foggiest idea where they came from, but most likely they had been ditched on the road. It's a common enough occurance here. I didn't know of any neighbor having Guinea hens. But when I returned home on Monday, they were gone. Moved on. Hopefully they found a place that suited them. 

4 comments:

  1. They're insect eaters. Don't feed like chickens or other birds. If you left them bugs (like cockroaches I suspect) they would have stayed. We had 10 of them at the ranch. I think they sound like the Martians in the movie Mars Attacks!

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  2. One of my neighbors just informed me that the birds might belong to a neighbor down the road some. If so, I'm impressed how far they range.

    Bugs eaters, eh? That's why they turned their noses up at the birdseed. Well, if they ever run out of bugs at home, they're always welcome to come eat some of mine!

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  3. Quite a striking sight and noise !
    Most sources say they eat seeds and bugs.
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guineafowl#Description

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  4. Su, they were on my driveway about a week ago. What beautiful birds and so evenly matched. They were a group of five at that time so looks like they are making it somehow. Always something on our block!

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