I am still trying to sort out the males and females amongst my ducks and geese. I know that having more than one drake in a small flock is not a good idea as they are pretty sexually aggressive-is it the same with ganders? Or are they perhaps less demanding of their lady friends?
I can only tell you about my experience. We had three ganders and four females. They were raised together from day one without any problems That was until the first breeding season. The largest male started beating up on the smaller male and nearly killed him. We had to separate our goose pen into three sections. We gave each male one female and the largest guy got two. This has worked out OK when we first separated them we had a fence between them The largest male could get his head throught the fence and still attakced the other one so we had to put up chicken wire as well. they still argue through the fence but cant reach each other. With our ducks I only wanted females and that worked out fine until DH's friend gave him his pair so now we have ten girls with one gander. They really run him around as he has a hard time catching them lol. Hope this helps. Micki
We had a mixed flock last year of a Toulouse pair, a Buff pair and an Embden trio. They all got along extremely well once they had established who was boss. The big old Embden had raised most of them up as goslings and our Toulouse gander thought it was time to take over the flock. I'm trying to find Pilgrim ganders to add to my flock for next year. I'm going to at least do pairs and I'm tempted to do five ganders to every four hens to try and help with fertility. Greyfield, you're our goose expert. What do you say?
Interesting. Right now they are about 8 weeks old and so far no problems. I have 11 geese (9 "weeder" geese, i think some sort of brown chinese cross? and two that appear to be Embden crosses) and 8 ducks (3 pekin, 4 runner, 1 Rouen), all living together. Obviously, they are still just big babies though, so I am just not sure what sort of living arrangements we will need as they mature.
I have 4 Ganders and 4 Females. Once mating season came. The dominated gander beat up one gander so bad. I came outside, and his beak was bleeding, he had blood on his legs, and he his feathers were ripped out. Now, since mating season is over. They get along fine.
The degree of brotherhood varies by season. But, in general, I find my ganders and drakes do very little harm to the birds or eachother. Their 'fights' are in slow motion and it's more like watching judo than boxing. Chickens, though, can be rough breeders.