Geese breeds & temperments

[Olive Hill]

Quote:
Of course.

Just keep in mind "personal experiences" may differ widely from what you were originally looking for according to your OP.

I'm not sure what you meant by "just keep in mind personal experiences may differ widely from what you were originally looking for according to your OP". My OP requested personal experiences. How does the OP differ from my above quote of "I'm still looking for personal experiences to decide the best breed for me"? I'm confused...

What I thought I conveyed in my OP was I wanted a calm breed but I was also looking for other peoples experiences with the breeds they have/had. Just because a chart may say a breed is "calm" if 20 different people then reported to me that one of those "calm" breeds was in their personal experience NOT calm it would make me think twice about that breed. Does that make sense?

Charts are a generalization of any breed. I am aware within each breed specific strains can vary widely in temperment. That said, when I requested personal experiences I was looking for personal experiences of those that have or have had geese in the past. I don't want to rely solely on charts for this information.

When I first got into chickens 8 years ago I went by what a chart suggested and got 2 white leghorn hens. According to the chart, they were prolific layers (which was good) but they were also high strung and pecked the other chicks until bloody. In fact, that practice lasted on and off until they both died. That kind of info wasn't in the chart

. I would never get another white leghorn based on my personal experience.

Ahh, didn't mean to cause confusion. In your OP you said you were looking for:

the "overall" average temperment of most breeds

which will not necessarily coincide with BYCers (or any group's) personal experience since BYC is a very small sampling of any given breed's overall tendencies. Twenty people is a very small sampling, in fact. Especially, for instance, if those twenty people were all BYCers since many BYCers tend to source their birds from the same places so it's an even smaller sample of the breed since it's all -- basically -- one strain.

Hopefully that makes more sense as to what I meant.

 

[Olive Hill]

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The section of property I was thinking of putting them in is wooded/fenced. There's certainly no grass there.

There's a big difference between a grassy, weedy orchard and what the OP describes. Actually, the fact that they were traditionally used as weeders reinforces the idea that they naturally crave and require green vegetation for both their diet and recreation.

You're right though, boredom would be one of the few things that would spur a goose to eat bark, and a goose with no grass or weeds to forage through would absolutely be an extremely bored goose. Layer pellets alone will not satisfy their instinctual need to mouth and chew. Because trees will be all that's available that's what they'll use. Once the easy pickings (saplings, etc.) are gone they will continue on with the mature trees. Nothing "bad" may come of it, but it's certainly not ideal. And something bad could come of it depending on the extent to which they mouth/chew/eat the trees, bark, etc.​

 

[Omniskies]

Ah, whoops. I didn't catch the bit about the lack of grass. Thanks for pointing it out to me.

I agree, why keep geese in an area without grass (if you can help it, anyway)? Geese eat a lot. A _lot_. The only thing that keeps them from being flully bottomless pits is that they will gorge on grass all day long, which will drastically reduce the feed bill.

In the winter you can definitely feel the strain when they are no longer grazing 24/7 out on tasty grass. At that point you may as well raise winter wheat.

 

[Olive Hill]

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No problem, I figured that was probably the case.

I literally laughed out loud at your comment about the grass keeping them from being bottomless pits. It's absolutely true. If they're not napping they're eating grass and weeds. The nice thing about it is you no longer have to mow the lawn so often (or at all! LOL!) but winter can be tough, for sure. I'm finding that a bale of hay works great for cutting the winter feed bill though. I have grass/alfalfa round bales near the winter hog pens for easy access (they're fed it free choice) and the geese just started helping themselves once the grass got sparse. I've made sure they have access since and so far, the feed bill has been reasonably similar to the warmer seasons as a result.

 

[Omniskies]

Really? I'll have to try that. My geese tend to chew on the hay, but they never seem to really eat it. Just make a huge, happy mess, that gets scattered everywhere and pooped on.

 

[Olive Hill]

Hmmm. If you haven't already maybe try leaving the bale intact. Mine help themselves off the round bale and can only pull a small amount off at a time. If it was loose I imagine they'd make a big old mess.

 

[sianara]

I haven't been able to stop thinking about getting a few geese in the spring and tonight when I was looking at several different websites it dawned on me that (DUH!!

) I can let a pair roam around my back yard during the day. It's already partially fenced and I could easily enclose the rest of the 40' x 40' area off to keep them in the back and not let them roam to the front of our property. They could also have access to the wooded fenced area with the ducks but I would mainly let the geese have the "big" back yard to themselves! I'm so excited now. I was just mentioning to DH that if I got some geese and let them graze in the backyard he wouldn't have to cut that lawn anymore he'd only have to do the front yard. His eyes lit up at that suggestion

as he spends about 2 hours cutting both lawns!

Ok, so now I've got to make a final decision between the Pilgrim and the American Buff! They are both beautiful and both seem to fit the attributes I'm looking for. I can get a pair of goslings of each breed from Metzers for around $44.

Omniskies, pm'ing you now...

 

[DaveK]

Not to be raining on your parade but geese are grazing animals. Even a pair on an area only 40x40 are not only going to negate the need for cutting grass, they will completely nuke it and you will have bare ground. Mud when things are wet. It'll be exactly the same situation that some people have with horses that they call "drylot" because there isn't room enough and so no chance of keeping vegetation alive. Geese can be kept alive and healthy when not allowed an area of suitable grazing but it takes some work and an understanding of diet including their need for fiber. It's also a lot easier to do this in a place that tends to stay dry, like the desert southwest. Drylot in many areas of the country is rarely all that dry and just one degree or another of mud. Just something to think about if you want to enjoy both your geese and the environment they are given/create.

 

[sianara]

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Raining is a good thing in this instance.

So, now I'm thinking maybe what I could do would be to move them between the front yard and the back yard every few days with some temporary fencing in the front. The front yard is triple the size of the back yard (the grassy areas that is). I know it would take some organization on my part to do this but you should see what I do for my animals NOW

Part of my thing is I'm not a farm girl so while I let them live like animals I put a ton of effort into making sure they have safe/healthy housing and yards while also making it as efficient as possible for me to tend them. (See my duck pond thread here... https://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=405350 ) Other people that don't have farm animals think I'm nuts when they see my set ups. Well, to be fair they are always polite but I can see the wheels turning in their heads with the words "She's nuts, I'd never go to this much trouble for animals!" spinning around

.

 

[sianara]

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What are the details of their diet and need for fiber?