The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Livestock => Poultry & Waterfowl => Topic started by: funkyfish on September 29, 2012, 09:17:13 am
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I have been offered a breeding trio of GF. -I thought they pair bonded?
I LOVE them and have wanted to keep them for ages, but hadn't got round to doing any research yet, and wanted to get them as keets/hatch they would be more tame.
Can I keep them with my hens/ducks? (all adult large fowl) Would they use the same house or would they need their own with higher perches? My lot are in a field kept in electric poultry netting, would they fly over? Do they need a special diet?
Am I better off waiting until I can get them their own space/house??
Any advice would be great!
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We had them for 3 years and they had their own house but the ones that did come in on a night used to go in with the chickens rather than their own shed.
Finding the eggs was a nightmare, we had 3 cock birds and 7 hen birds and they had free range over acres and acres of land. We quite often found nests of 20+ eggs in the fields.
They will definatly fly over the electric netting. Ours used to fly over 7 ft femces and could fly from the ground to the top of a tree and also the whole length of a 15 acre field no problem.
If you have neighbours unless they are very understanding dont get them as they are very noisy and can be heard from a long way away
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Humm, will have to think about it. I thought they might be escape artists! I don't mind them roaming (excpet for foxes) but my neighbour might not. Will ask first. Noise not a problem- neighbour/friend has 30+ pigs and other neighbour has the noisiest geese ever!
Thanks! :)
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Hiya Ff :wave:
My OH has just hatched some GF - after doing a fair amount of research, which says -
They can fly well, they need their own house (with high perching) & there's over 30 different colours & 2 types of strains - 1 for meat . They can be reared & kept on the same food as chickens though.
It's also better to get them as keets or hatch your own if you want them to be "tame" (never as much as chickens though). They are also monogamous & prefer to be kept in pairs.
They are also VERY noisy - like little alarms & will soon let you know if there's a strange animal (Mr Reynard for example) about - so you may need to sweet-talk the neighbours before getting any :innocent: