I just happened upon this thread. First off, I’m very sorry that you lost your keets. I’ve read the whole thread and agree with most of the other comments that nothing listed in that feed should result in rapid death of keets. I’m on another guinea group in Facebook where the moderators are adamant that all keets be on medicated, amprolium containing feed. I don’t necessarily agree, but there are thousands of people on that forum that routinely feed keets medicated feed with a similar protein to your bag.
However, what is sadly common on all of the guinea groups that I am on is that keets are delicate and often die of unknown causes at a few days to a few weeks of age. We’ve had several sad threads and discussions about this on the BYCs Guinea fowl forum. Some possible culprits are shavings or other foreign body that was swallowed, cocciosis, enteritis (pasty butt), too cold, genetics, etc. My own keets that I’ve bred, hatched and raised myself rarely have more than a few losses, and others report the same. I suspect that keets just don’t travel as well as chicks, and that the shipping stress predisposes them to disease. People may lose a lot of keets at once, then the losses stop and remaining keets do well. I would love to necropsy any that I lose, but while our Oklahoma Animal Disease Diagnostic Lab will necropsy chicks and chickens for free through their influenza screening program, they won’t extend that to guineas fowl. I’m glad to hear that your losses have stopped and hope that your keets continue to do well!
However, what is sadly common on all of the guinea groups that I am on is that keets are delicate and often die of unknown causes at a few days to a few weeks of age. We’ve had several sad threads and discussions about this on the BYCs Guinea fowl forum. Some possible culprits are shavings or other foreign body that was swallowed, cocciosis, enteritis (pasty butt), too cold, genetics, etc. My own keets that I’ve bred, hatched and raised myself rarely have more than a few losses, and others report the same. I suspect that keets just don’t travel as well as chicks, and that the shipping stress predisposes them to disease. People may lose a lot of keets at once, then the losses stop and remaining keets do well. I would love to necropsy any that I lose, but while our Oklahoma Animal Disease Diagnostic Lab will necropsy chicks and chickens for free through their influenza screening program, they won’t extend that to guineas fowl. I’m glad to hear that your losses have stopped and hope that your keets continue to do well!