Goslings of 2014 Hatch-a-long

[bibkel]

Maggie went broody today

on 6-8 eggs. All eggs are hers its her private nest in the old dog house so if anything other than tufted babies comes out i will know shes been a loosy goosy cheatin on her mate Daddy Tufted. They will be due May 16th which is 15 days after the ones in the bator are due.

I am excited for you! Mine started setting about 5 days ago, so we will be hatching about the same time. She is going to be 1 year old on April 29th and she is sitting on 8-9 eggs at least.
I broke down and got the Sebbie babies......they are 3 days old now. The female is SOOOO affectionate, and the male is jumpy, he tries to jump out of his box every time he sees us.
I love to cuddle with them, the girl is tucked in my shirt right now, snoozing away.
I went out to talk to my flock (my ducks are beating up on my gimpy male) so I could check out the condition of them, and I wee wee'd to my Pilgrim gander, Clyde. He wee wee'd back, no honking or hissing to me. It really does make a difference if you talk to them.

Here is a picbof my 3 day old. She is the only one that hatched from the 3 eggs i set. My daughter and i vent sexed this little one and are pretty sure she is a she. She sure is cute. Now i just have to figure out what breed she is.

I cannot get the hang of this vent sexing! they ALL look like girls! I tried with my male, again, and still no manly display. Grrr.

 

[psue]

they are NOT in a hurry

 

[Starfire669]

Oh ok i was going to say if you didnt still have him, you STILL had one lol
I see atleast 3 ganders there.

That's what I thought, that the 4 geese I had left from the first batch were all boys. I will try and get better individual photos of the 8 babies for better guesses as to sex. I am hoping that the little gozzies are girls.

 

[psue]

Jean Luc is the first daddy of the season.,,,,,



Jerry would have been over joyed

 

[8GeeseALaying]

That's what I thought, that the 4 geese I had left from the first batch were all boys. I will try and get better individual photos of the 8 babies for better guesses as to sex. I am hoping that the little gozzies are girls.

Serv is better at genders. I still think they are boys though.

Jean Luc is the first daddy of the season.,,,,, Jerry would have been over joyed

Aww Congrats!

 

[psue]

Serv is better at genders. I still think they are boys though.

Aww Congrats!

thanks 8

 

[animaladdictions]

HOWDY OLD PALS!!!!

Long time since I've talked to any of you guys! I hope your hatching season is going better than mine. Unfortunately I think this will just have to be a dud year for me. I found out I had cervical cancer this past October...about a week before my 40th birthday to beat it all! Since then things have been pretty much insane! I've been pretty darn sick as you can imagine but I'm finally feeling a bit better now. I've had 25 daily internal radiation treatments along with 6 chemotherapy treatments. When those were done I had to have five internal (brachytherapy) treatments. Those were the WORST! They put me to sleep for each one and basically inserted radiation filled tubes inside and radiated from the inside out to try and kill the rest of the tumor and any remaining cells. Thank heaven those are finally done...Now I'm going through what seems like the hardest part...WAITING to see if all this stuff worked or not! My first appt. with the oncologist isn't until May 10th and I'm pretty sure I won't even find out anything that day. UGGGH! I sure hope I'm gonna be okay. I'm really scared.

Anyway, back to the geese! I had gotten so sick and weak before I found out I had cancer that my youngest son started taking care of all my birds for me. He's been amazing! Unfortunately, the cancer and another really bad family issue had my mind focused elsewhere. I finally got my bator up and running almost two weeks ago and set 24 eggs...so far it looks like they're ALL duds! I'm so upset with myself. I should have been on top of things more. I set another nine a couple days ago and I think at least one of my fertile girls is still laying (one is a yearling and wouldn't ya know it she's a laying machine but it being her first year she has no fertiles!), so I'm hoping I can hatch out at least a couple beebees this season.

Iain...you KNOW how much I want eggs from your gorgeous trio! Are you still taking any orders?

Anyone else have nice dewlaps that would be willing to part with a few eggs? My hope is to get a new really nice quality grey gander so I can add some new blood in my line. Hope you all are happy and more importantly HEALTHY since I last saw (spoke to) yuns!

Blessings!

 

[cluckcluckluke]

Quote: oh...hahah. Thank you for the correction

.
Well I want to be over with you guys then. Now I have to WAIT

.
Although, in saying that I managed to find some one who can give me some Chinese X Pilgrims egg and Chinese lay earlier so that is less waiting and I will still be able to ID sex at birth because the sex linked birds continue on even to the 2md x.

Quote: hm....I was hoping to get them in the next 1-2 month. 4 months is a real long wait and I am horrible with patience.lol.
I live in NSW, you?

 

[livininbrazil]

Will they have access to water to bathe in? Too cold for that. I would bring them out, let them gnaw on some grass, pose for some. Pictures that you post here, of course. I will watch them, pick them up to check for cold pitter patters and limit it to about an hour, unless they seem chilled. Get them in RIGHT AWAY and blow dry if they get wet.

x2 as long as there is sun get them out for a little while at least. I've even been known to put up a wind block so they could stay out longer. But do keep them dry till they are somewhere warmer.

x3. Too cold for a paddle, and a wind-break is good.
I put one up for mine, that acts as a wind-break when it´s a colder wind, and as a shade when it gets hot in the day.

 

[livininbrazil]

I am currently feeding my chicken flock chick feed so that will be handy if I can just continue it on with my Goslings.
Ok, I have the perfect cage/ run thing for these little guys...for their first few weeks any way then they will probably get to big.
Niacin sounds very important for geese ( adults to? ) how come ducks don't need it? or I have never been told they do.

I have just checked out Vegemite and it contains Vitamins B1, B2 AND B3 so this should be fine? It also has Folate which is B9.
It also says that Niacin is 25% of every 5g serving, at 2.5mg. So that brings me to another question....How much Vegemite should I put in their water each day???


Thank you and that's exactly what I am hoping to do, avoid all unnecessary problems.
I most certainly will. In fact I will probably overload you all and then you'll wish you never asked

.

I have been talking to some people about acquiring some eggs off of them and they say that they won't have egg until Spring, which is SEPTEMBER for us down here. That is ages away!!!
Did you not say breeding/ hatching occurs in Winter? Which for us is right about now!!!

Well, sometimes ducks do need it. they just don´t seem to get such regular problems as goslings do, and yes, some adult geese too.
I think Tillyita will help you with the amount of vegemite, I just use the Brewers Yeast.
Feel free to ask any questions. Sometimes goslings are lost, and it´s unavoidable, but we all feel sad when a gosling is lost unnecessarily.
As regards winter, it seems the short days kick off their breeding season, so my lot here get noisy in June into July. So here, it starts with the noise in June. Maybe eggs in July...or August. Goslings in august or September..... Here we do get some July hatches, and last year i had an early November hatch, so as you´re much the same latitude, I reckon you should find eggs from July onward. We´re just north of the tropic of Capricorn, so it depends on where you are..the further south, of course, the chillier it´ll be and that can put them back too, of course.
Seeing as geese can live for 20 years or so, it´s worth waiting to get the ones you want! And it sounds like the happy little things are going to get a great home!