Are any of my goose eggs fertile?

Gossie

Chirping
Jun 14, 2015
168
26
81
Hi!

I have a brown chinese crested goose pair, who have previously hatched goslings with their own eggs. Starting at the beginning of April, my goose, Buttercup, started laying eggs. She laid 14-16 eggs, but I haven't caught her sitting on the nest in the last two weeks. I saw her sit on it for a few days, but after that, I haven't seen her near her nest.
Her nest is still is good shape, the eggs seem to be turned every day, and she's still protecting it (I'm going to have a nasty goose bite bruise on my shoulder tomorrow) but I wanted to see if the eggs would actually hatch, so I candled the eggs. It's not something I regularly do, because I'm not the best at is, so I have no idea if there are goslings developing in my eggs, or not. I took some pictures and would love to see what you think.

I don't think these ones have goslings, but I thought I would check!
big_smile.png






These were the ones I wasn't to sure about, especially the last one.






Sorry for the quality of the pictures.

If some of them are fertile, which ones, and if none of them are fertile, how should I dispose of the eggs without devastating Buttercup?

Thank you!
 
The first two look like duds, the second two look fertile, the fourth I'm not sure, it seems like a gosling was developing, but maybe died, and the last one looks fertile. I'm not an expert on this, though, this is just from the rusty information I learned when doing a competition at Penn State, so don't toss the eggs until someone with more experience responds.

I think so long as she still has some eggs she'll be okay if you toss the other ones :)
 

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