Guinea Fowl Nutritional Requirements

Adult guineas forage for themselves and are able to meet most of their nutrition requirements on their own. They consume a variety of insects and arachnids (mosquitoes, ticks, beetles, and so on), weed seeds, slugs, worms, and caterpillars. Guineas need to consume some greens in order to maintain good digestion, and so they eat grass, dandelions, weeds, and other vegetation.

Because the birds are consuming vegetation, it is important to make sure grit is available for the birds, and the birds also benefit from having oyster shell available. Provide clean water at all times. Guineas do enjoy a little scratch feed on the ground. They like wheat, sorghum, or millet grain and will ignore whole corn kernels. If you are keeping the guineas for pest control, restricting their feed will encourage them to spend more time eating insects.

If for any reason guinea fowl are not allowed to forage, they can be fed a commercial poultry diet. It is important to use an unmedicated feed. Guineas need a higher protein feed than chickens, but do quite well on regular poultry diets. Keets need a 24% to 26% protein ration as the starter feed.

The protein level should be reduced to 18% to 20% for the fifth to eighth weeks. After eight weeks, the keets can be fed a 16% layer mash. If your feed mill does not sell feeds in the proper protein levels, you can mix a higher protein feed with a laying-hen mash to get the proper protein level. Guineas should be fed mash or crumbles. Pelleted feed is not recommended for guineas.

You should also provide supplemental greens, such as leafy alfalfa, for the guineas to peck. They will eat the leaves. It is important to remove any leftovers daily to prevent a mold problem.

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