keets

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FactsAreUseless: Feb 16, 2011

Good birds good thread good job.

# ¿ May 5, 2016 13:19

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# ¿ Apr 27, 2024 13:53

FactsAreUseless: Feb 16, 2011

Ausrotten posted:

keets!

Did you grow those, or were they just in the paper towel roll?

# ¿ Jun 10, 2016 16:35

FactsAreUseless: Feb 16, 2011

Avshalom posted:

if any of you have a question that can be summed up as "should i get keets" then the answer is yes you should get keets, they're delightful. just a few suggestions:

1) get guinea fowl eggs and incubate them if you can, because then you get newborn keets and they're the cutest, and more importantly because that means they always think of your property as home. whatever container you use as a brooder box you can just put in your coop for a few days once they're off the heat and they'll go back to it at night once you let them out to run around. hypothetically. it works with my keets but some keets are stupider/smarter and will never see the box as their house no matter how long they spend locked in it. also if you raise chicken chicks and keets together, they form a flock and when the chickens naturally come home in the evenings the keets follow them

2) if you get older keets, don't let them roam for at least a week after you bring them home. they do develop a homing instinct eventually but for the first few days they yearn for the wilderness until they figure out where the food comes from. always feed them in the coop at first.

3) i've never had a problem with any chicks eating pine shavings but i'd give the keets a week to figure out what's food and what's not

4) ausrotten, your keets are all going to stay more or less the same colour except for the brown ones with stripy heads - that's the original wild colour and they grow up pearl (black with white spots and blue heads). some of them might get lighter or darker but they won't change dramatically. i'm really interested to see what the little white one with the brown streak looks like! they are a beautiful little cluster

5) don't get keets in winter unless you have a very well-insulated or heated barn, even if they're old enough not to need a brooder. i bought seventeen (!!) recently and the first time it rained they all went out and stood in it like a pack of idiots, i had to do a dramatic rescue and lost five from hypothermia because they were wet in addition to being cold, which is something they don't deal with. luckily my quail shed was set up fairly well already so i was able to seal it off and fill it with straw and the remaining twelve keets are doing fine. they and the quails seem to be getting along well which is pretty cute. i'll be moving them back out soon when they're better able to cope with the cold but just keep it in mind, they can and will kill themselves in any way possible

my surviving three from the last brood (two piebalds and a lavender) are doing well and have graduated to the big chook roosts. if you can't see the lavender one, look closely at the stripy hen on the lefthand side:

keets!

Everything in this is excellent.

# ¿ Jun 23, 2016 13:29

FactsAreUseless: Feb 16, 2011

Avshalom posted:

the keets had their first real adventure today! first i put them on the grass but they got scared and keeted at me

until i put them back on the verandah, where they chilled out with their siblings (a silver grey dorking and a maran plymouth cross of the same age)

and their surrogate mother bumblebee

and i can't believe this but i actually got the snuggling on camera

it's hard to handle sometimes