Anyone Raise Geese For Meat?

[feathersnuggles]

Thanks Oregon Blue for the butcher age info. Also, did you mean there are fewer pin feathers, the older they get?

Your relatives are very lucky, for sure!

 

[gamefowl guy]

Quote:

I plan on trying geese for meat in the future - I love how they can thrive on 100% grass over the summer, compared to the constant craving chickens have for mash.

 

[Oregon Blues]

Pin feathers occur whenever the bird molts and replaces it's feathers. So, they still have pin feathers all their life, every time they molt.

 

[Ibicella]

Quote:
1. I haven't for a long time, but we raised Toulouse on the farm I worked at as a youth. We culled them at around 15 weeks of age.

2. We would wrap them in a burlap sack to keep them from flapping and then hook the head between two nails on a stump. One person would hold the bird, and another would swing the axe. The person holding would then immediately hand the bird upside down to let it bleed out.

3. Depends on the age, breed, and size of the bird, but Toulouse's can get up to 20-26 pounds. You don't want them to get that big unless you have a lot of people to feed! Typically you want them to be around 10-12 pounds butchered weight.

4. Goose reminds me of a much greasier and stronger tasting version of duck. If you have never cooked a goose before, you will have a shocking amount of fat coming out of it. After you remove all the obvious fat off of it, be sure to prick the skin of the bird all over (being careful not to peirce the meat) so the excess fat has a route to run out of. Dump it in boiling water for a minute or two to get more to melt out of it and then let it rest one more day to dry out in the fridge. Then you can cook it.

Remember to siphon fat off with a bulb out of the pan periodically. Keep some of the drippings. It's pretty awesome for frying things like hashbrowns in!

 

[goosebegon]

Check out Holderreads site for ducks and geese he is considered by many to be one of the world's finest breeders and the quality and its authenticityof his stock is widely held to be without equal

 

[FarmTillURdead]

I raised 5 geese last year.

Problems I had were - they were hard to put up at night. They don't learn like chickens. Herding them in their house was difficult each and every night.
They constantly played in the mud making mud pies in all of my poultry waterers.
This makes me crazy as I wanted clean food! I was cleaning 3 waterers twice a day.
They loved their messy waterers, and protected them, and wouldn't let my 100 other birds get a drink in 100 degree heat.
They do have a lot of personality! Like teddy bears!
They feel like teddy bears when you pick them up for slaughter.

They were very hard to cut the jugular through the thick feathers and they don't die quick like chickens. Taking upwards of 5 minutes with both veins cut.
I have slaughtered a few hundred birds and geese was my most miserable experience!
They are fuzzy and hard to kill - not for the meager heart.
Plucking was a nightmare.
They are greasy on the outside so scalding was difficult. Commercial birds are waxed.
I added detergent and it helped but they bogged down my wiz-bang and had to be hand plucked - very messy with down.
The biggest trouble I had was thinking I would want to do it again because after I had smoked them, then pressure cooked the meat from the bones to get it all I am hooked!
Save your broth!
Now you know the worst! Hope that doesn't detour you… but I thought they were good facts to share.

 

[bj taylor]

oregon blue, what is the goose in your pic?

 

[bj taylor]

i think i would go with the wrapping the bird in burlap & decapitating considering the info shared here. 5 min to die is way too long for me, even if it means less effective bleed out, i think i would go for quick. but i am intriqued by the idea of raising geese.

if geese are hard to put up at night, what is it that they prefer? are they wanting to stay out all night? my chicks (6 wks old) are still afraid of the dark. they head for the coop pretty quick in the evening.

 

[Oregon Blues]

oregon blue, what is the goose in your pic?

That is a yearling Blue American. My Americans are clownish and crave attention. They love to follow me around and hold a conversation. I talk, they burble

 

[zzGypsy]

i think i would go with the wrapping the bird in burlap & decapitating considering the info shared here. 5 min to die is way too long for me, even if it means less effective bleed out, i think i would go for quick. but i am intriqued by the idea of raising geese.

if geese are hard to put up at night, what is it that they prefer? are they wanting to stay out all night? my chicks (6 wks old) are still afraid of the dark. they head for the coop pretty quick in the evening.

mine aren't particularly hard to put up at night, and often will put themselves up, as will my ducks. when they are busy playing and don't want to go up, a small scoop of corn solves the problem, and basic herding skills work well with geese... I've got a post on here a while back where I covered all you need to know to herd ducks and geese, I'll dig it up if you're interested.

the basic routine for getting geese (or ducks) to go up easily at night is this:
1) pen them in the intended night-pen for a week or two so they know where they live
2) always feed them inside their night pen
3) feed at night, not in the morning - give them a happy reason to go in the pen at night
4) maintain proper respect from them... don't let them dominate you or you won't be able to herd them when needed
5) practice herding them at other times (besides bed time) so they - and you - learn to do the herding thing separate from bedtime
6) put them up every night, no exceptions
7) expect them to test you from time to time, especially at the beginning of breeding season, or when they enter breeding age... don't let them get anything by you, testing will stop if you're consistant in managing them

anyway, that's what we've done successfully with quite a few batches of ducks and geese, and the more we stick with the program, the better it works. if you skip any of the parts (we have sometimes) it will mean you occasionally have to work a little harder to put them up, but overall, we don't struggle with them at all.

we've mostly kept african or chinese geese (white or brown) and they're pretty loud, pretty bossy, somewhat excitable, so not the easiest of geese to work with.

what do they prefer? out all night partying!
mine are as active at night as during the day, they'll nap some, then putter about some. if they have the option, they'll be back and forth from the pond to the hutch at least a dozen times a night. and if it's rained and there are mudpuddles... well they'll dabble in those all night long.