Adding goslings to my Muscovy flock

[The Dapper Duck]

Hey, look at me, my first thread! I did some snooping around and couldn't find anything specifically on this subject so I'll ask here.

I pulled the trigger this morning and ordered up 5 French Toulouse goslings. They will be arriving in a little less than three weeks. I'm actually out of town until June, so my partner is going to be taking care of them and she's not much of a carpenter. So they are going to be brooded in a chicken tractor and kept next to the house for a while so they can be monitored and have a heat lamp and all that. I ordered up some electric netting so they can eventually be pastured, but that is being used to surround the current coop/run until I get back and can make a new one or patch it up to keep predators out.

I have 7 Muscovies right now, just one drake, and 7 Pekin ducklings that are almost the size of the Muscovy hens now (and growing). I'm also acquiring a breeding quartet of Barbezieux from a friend. I've mixed chickens and Muscovies before so I don't see much issue there, but I have zero experience with geese. My plan was to move them into the coop/run once they outgrew the tractor. This is all on a new property so things are getting shaken up in a lot of ways and I thought why not make all the changes at once instead of waiting until next year?

Is this the worst idea ever? Can anyone tell me what kinds of problems to expect? What is the best way to transition them into the coop? Our drake is a big baby and not aggressive, but one of the hens is pretty standoffish to new birds. With the Pekins being added now, and the Barbs later, will the goslings have an easier transition or will that be the straw that breaks the Muscovy's back?

Thanks for your input and for reading my extremely long post!

 

[Roo5]

I’ve actaully intergarted Chinese’s geese into my ducks flock.Of course that didn’t consist any moscovies.Hiwever I had about 9 maybe 10 ducks at the time and three were drakes.It worked well for me once the geese were about seven maybe with months and it was breeding season.The animals just merged together.Assuming probably BECAUS ethe three geese were two ganders and a hen,and actually that was where the only conflict was,and after the subordinate gander lost the hen he paired with a pair of large pekin ducks, and pretty much moved in the duck and chicken run with them, while the goose pair stayed in a dog pen.Of course with their friend being paired up with the duck flock it caused to want to be closer with him,which means get closer to the ducks ,and adventually they just merged.Never had any issues with fighting,I had a khaki hen who had a huge issue with goose joining them, but the only thing she ever did was stick her beak out at out and griped about it, it was actually funny.There was some bickering within the geese and ducks but never caught them fighting,bunless the goose made an attempt to breed the drakes the hen, then the drake would try pushing the goose off.However I know scovies operate differently so your experience may involve way more dominating.

 

[The Dapper Duck]

Well that's some good news. Like I said, my ducks are pretty chill except for that one hen. She doesn't just chase, she grabs and rides whichever other hen got in her way. I may end up isolating her in the chicken tractor and just let her set on eggs

 

[hereorthere]

I raised 2 Toulouse (females) with 5 Muscovies (2 males and 3 females) & 5 Pekins (females) last year - outside brooder with heat lamp until feathered with they're own run. The integration was easy since they were set up in the same run with an established flock of chickens and adult Welsh Harlequins. Allowed lots of look-see. Just make sure you have overhead netting as aerial predators are always a possibility. Toulouse and Muscovies got along well with each other...but they were raised as babies. Toulouse are really gentle giants....eventually both girls figured out that they were bigger than everyone else and fought back. It was just 1 or 2 alpha chicken hens who bullied everyone at first - usually during feeding time; so if you have plenty of feeders spaced far enough apart, that should reduce that.

 

[The Dapper Duck]

We ended up canceling the order because she ended up having to leave town a couple weekends while they would have been in the brooder. I might try for it when I get back, but by then I will be able to build a decent brooder and planning on making a second aviary and coop. So there might not be a need to put them into the mix as goslings, or even put them in at all if I can make a shelter for them to move on pasture inside some electric netting. The ducks took to the new chickens we added in just fine, and those all just got thrown into the new coop on the same day for lack of other options.

Thanks for the replies. If we do this I will definitely make sure they have enough room in the new run to be able to spread out.