few questions from a newbie

[C8yJayne]

hi just a few questions:
1. my goslings are 4 and 5 weeks old and are following me everywhere which I love to some extent, will this reduce or stop?
2. will they be ok in the chicken coop with the chickens at night?
3. how long do they need to be on duck and goose starter? also I find the chickens eat the gosling feed and vice versa is this ok or should I feed them seperate?

 

[servpolice]

They will eventually stop following about 5 months depending on breed since they think your the parent and they can live with chickens but it will be messy and after 3 months or less they can get off the that food

 

[Miss Lydia]

hi just a few questions:
1. my goslings are 4 and 5 weeks old and are following me everywhere which I love to some extent, will this reduce or stop?
2. will they be ok in the chicken coop with the chickens at night?
3. how long do they need to be on duck and goose starter? also I find the chickens eat the gosling feed and vice versa is this ok or should I feed them seperate?

I would hesitate putting goslings in with adult chickens, hens can be pretty mean and your gosling are still babies.

Don't mean to go against what serv says but I have seen my LF hens peck my ducklings and goslings and if they couldn't have gotten away they could have been injured.

Welcome to BYC

 

[arielleacres]

Hi my chickens geese and ducks all go in the same house, theres even some roosters in there. Most gooslings can fend for themselves, however for the first 4-6 weeks they are in the baby hatchery coops at our place. What kind of hens do you have and how big is the house they are in. Mine are in an off shot building attached to the barn. My geese still follow me around but not as much. They are the best attack dogs. We run about 30 geese(consisting of pilgrim, Chinese and a couple other types) and we have had less coyette and fox problems then the guy down the road and hes got 2 great Pyrenees dogs and we both run a flock of sheep.

 

[Miss Lydia]

Hi my chickens geese and ducks all go in the same house, theres even some roosters in there. Most gooslings can fend for themselves, however for the first 4-6 weeks they are in the baby hatchery coops at our place. What kind of hens do you have and how big is the house they are in. Mine are in an off shot building attached to the barn. My geese still follow me around but not as much. They are the best attack dogs. We run about 30 geese(consisting of pilgrim, Chinese and a couple other types) and we have had less coyette and fox problems then the guy down the road and hes got 2 great Pyrenees dogs and we both run a flock of sheep.

Welcome to BYC... big difference between you and OP you have 30 geese of differing ages most likely? So babies get protection from older geese if trouble starts, thats the way it is here but to put 4-5 week old geese by themselves into a house with other adults birds well I wouldn't do it, and then I wouldn't put adult geese in a house with ducks/chickens either, my geese don't tolerate having other birds in close quarters and someone would get hurt or killed most likely. Just observation from my neck of the woods.

 

[arielleacres]

Hi no, all of them came in the same year and i had my hens from the past couple years. After they were in their baby coops they went to live in with the chickens and ducks and have been happy ever since. I tried to keep them really separate from each other last time i had geese and i didn't like the way my geese acted (mean like you say) towards other birds. If you put them in with the others when they are still young, but not less then like 4-6 weeks(depending on the breed) i find they do better because the geese will grow up more like guardian dogs. Where i keep my chickens at night only is 40x14 so they have a lot of space, but then again there are a lot of chickens. lol They are free to roam during the day but mostly stay near the house or in our back pasture. We run about 30 geese, 30 ducks, and about 100 chickens that stay in the place at night. We do have more but some run with our horses and sheep out in the field and they roost in the trees. This is just my experience though. The best way to do it may take some time with your geese and put them in with your hens and watch, see what happens, different hens and different gooslings may act different depending on the breed.