They weigh about 1.3 kilograms (2.9 lb). Guinea fowl are birds within the order of Galliformes, which also includes such birds as … They spend most of their time on the ground, looking… Origin. Helmeted guinea fowl are seasonal breeders. They have also begun to adapt incredibly well to living in cities such as Cape Town. This is because they need the protein to produce the eggs. They walk a lot too (around 7-miles per day) and they do so at an astonishingly fast speed. Join Our Mailing List to Get Daily Animal Profiles & Animal News Delivered to Your Mailbox. However, most people will not be raising their guineafowl for the eggs. This guineafowl makes a tremendous pet. A red band runs around the top of the head. Many people claim that there are no grasshoppers anywhere near a guineafowl flock. 1. Probably the only issue that you will have when it comes to finding the Helmeted guineafowl as a pet is that there are not many breeders about. This is why I wanted to share with you a list of things I wish someone had told me before bringing them home. It cannot sustain a long-flight. Guineafowl, particularly the helmeted variety, have a long history of domestication. This species spends most of its time on the ground. Helmeted Guineafowls Facts as a Pet. Here they move slower and seem to know to stick to footpaths. Their beak is yellow. Its body plumage is gray-black spangled with white. The other benefit of raising Helmeted guineafowl as pets is their ability to be insect exterminators. The Helmeted Guineafowl is one of the most common guineafowl breeds in the world and in the Unites States. The helmeted guineafowl is a large 53 to 58 centimetres (21 to 23 in) bird with a round body and small head. A red band runs around the top of the head. You certainly wouldn’t want to be raising the helmeted guineafowl if you only have a small garden. Their breeding season lasts for around 2-months, and they will lay 1-2 eggs per week. This means that they can be a bit tricky to find if you live in smaller areas, or in a city. Groups have been seen mounting a communal defense against attackers. The wings are short and rounded, and the tail is likewise short. The helmeted guineafowl would have been first domesticated in the 5th Century BC, and imported to the United States at some point in the 18th or 19th Centuries. If you do, then they would have escaped from a domesticated flock of guineafowl. Humans have domesticated one species, the Helmeted species. Helmeted guinea fowl are the original birds from which domestic guinea fowl were bred. During the breeding season the male and female guinea fowl will call to each other at the same … In the summer months, when it is breeding, around 80% of their diet will be larger insects. The body plumageis gray-black spangled with white. Helmeted Guineafowl are often domesticated. It looks like a bump. Summer is the peak breeding season through which the testes might weigh as much as 1.6 gm, whereas during winter no breeding activity takes place. When disturbed, … This is part of the reason as to why they are pests. On top of … They will also only breed in the summer months. They are a monogamous breed, which is why it would be quite difficult to breed the helmeted guineafowl in captivity. Helmeted Guinea fowl are omnivorous. They are extremely good foragers and they will eat anything that they find. Just like chickens, they use their short beaks and feet to scratch up soils and rubble in search of food. If you encountered it in the wild, then it wouldn’t be uncommon to see them in flocks of over 30-birds. Don’t get me wrong, I have grown to love our guineas very much, but it has taken some serious getting used to. The ancestors of the guinea fowl we are so familiar with today were re-introduced to Europe during the fifteenth century and became popular in Britain and from there was taken by colonists and introduced to other parts of the world.