Geese eggs

heatherfeather7 said:

I have put a tray of food out and water, she hasn't taken from either of them. But, she does go down to the pond about once a day and bathes and drinks and then comes back up to nest. I tried to sneak in last night and grab an egg when she went down to water, but the gander came flying at me out of nowhere. ~sheesh~

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heatherfeather7 said:

She looks better now than she did when she first started sitting. I looked between the deck stairs today when she got up to get some water and there are 4 eggs on top of the nest and I think they may all have tiny hairline cracks ... I hope that doesn't mean they are about to explode?!?

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heatherfeather7 said:

Well it is now something like Day 46 or 47, Mama Goose is still intent on sitting on the eggs. Yesterday, my dogs were going nuts so I went outside to see what the problem was, there was a large (5-6' long) black snake about 3 feet away from mama goose. I am assuming it was a rat snake. But, THIS is not okay. I guess her eggs attracted it? She did not seem to care at all that there was a snake there.

I went inside to grab my pistol to shoot it, when I came back outside it was gone. Could not locate it - not too willing to search for it too much as I am terrified of snakes.

There are at least 4 eggs still there on the top of the nest, along with one large rock (???), and she doesn't appear to have any intentions on getting off.

UGH!

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heatherfeather7 said:

Came home today to find that one of the eggs is gone, I suspect the snake I saw yesterday waited on her to go to pond and had himself a little meal. I threw some feed out and she went over to eat so I was able to look in between stairs of deck and see in nest. There were several flies flying around the 3 remaining eggs. I tried to reach the eggs with a garden hoe but was unsuccessful. I would imagine the snake will come back. If the snake eats all the eggs will she abandon the nest then?

She appears to be fine. She's old, but she's not losing weight and she's staying clean and shiny. (With the exception of her chest area where she has pulled her feathers to line nest.)

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heatherfeather7 said:

I need to find another adult that can come help me I suppose. I can't crawl under deck and protect myself from the gander at the same time.

Going to work on that this weekend, her nest appears clean (as far as a goose nest goes), it is not soiled with poop, I can't smell the eggs (yet), but I certainly can't imagine them not being rotten at this point.

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