Goose deformity

[gocrow77]

After waiting 30+ days, and watching bator tv non stop, it was apparent that our goose egg had something wrong with it. I had kept humidity pretty high for lockdown, so I had doubts it was that. However, I do now know the problem. This goose egg was internally pipped for nearly 4 days before I made a tiny hole in the large end - we waited patiently for 3 more days. Finally this morning when I heard the peeps were getting much much weaker I widened the hole and found this poor baby has extreme cross beak. I am hoping that someone out there can tell us what we did wrong. This was a "gift egg" from some friends we know that show their poultry. They pretty much gave us around three dozen eggs that were all gathered that day - the goose egg was one of them; we also hatched out nearly all of the bantam and duck eggs we were given with no real problems. His female Pom had been in with a few males of different breeds over the last few weeks so he said it would not be purebred, but still we were kinda excited. Is this just rotten luck??? Or maybe a result of the cross since Poms are descended from a different species than the other breeds? Very disappointed and don't see anything we can do except cull this poor guy - I don't think he will ever be able to eat with a bill that misaligned.........

 

[Keene's coop]

poor thing. i'm so sorry

 

[goosedragon]

Quote:
Really? what species do you think the Poms are decended from that is different than the other breeds? Most domestic geese are descended from the Greylag Goose (Anser anser). The Chinese and African Geese are the domestic breeds of the Swan Goose (A. cygnoides) of course the Canada Goose and the Egyptian Goose are other semi-domestic species. and there is a bunch of "wild" species kept by a few breeders. Do your friends that gave you the gift egg keep any of the other species (not breeds)? Birth defects happen, if it was mine I would cull it but thats my opinion.

 

[gocrow77]

According to my Pocketful of Poultry book (pg 224) Pomeranian geese are descended from the Eastern Greylag while most domestic breeds are descended from the Western Greylag. I don't know enough about geese to know what the real difference is or if it would effect the offspring in any way. Yes, I am going to have to cull it - just not looking forward to that since this guy was highly anticipated. I didn't even want a goose and was kinda hoping at first it would be a dud, but sort of got sucked into being excited about it by my oldest son - he want some Toulouse geese. I don't know what all they kept except he did mention he had Chinese.......

 

[goosedragon]

Quote:
That may or may not be true but the eastern and western greyleg are at best sub species of the greyleg species, and all the species should be able to mate with others of the species.

 

[gocrow77]

Quote:
That may or may not be true but the eastern and western greyleg are at best sub species of the greyleg species, and all the species should be able to mate with others of the species.

Ok, so that rules out crossing species being an issue for this lil one. By the way, thanks for all your feedback Goosedragon, it will sure be of help later. I know my son will want to try again and with the breed he truly prefers. I would like to get him some babies that will not have this heartbreaking issue. I did pretty much everything incubation wise according to the thread on here about incubating goose eggs.

https://www.backyardchickens.com/web/viewblog.php?id=15806-goose-egg-hatching
Things were pretty steady with temps and humidity.....

 

[goosedragon]

Quote:
That may or may not be true but the eastern and western greyleg are at best sub species of the greyleg species, and all the species should be able to mate with others of the species.

Ok, so that rules out crossing species being an issue for this lil one. By the way, thanks for all your feedback Goosedragon, it will sure be of help later. I know my son will want to try again and with the breed he truly prefers. I would like to get him some babies that will not have this heartbreaking issue. I did pretty much everything incubation wise according to the thread on here about incubating goose eggs.

https://www.backyardchickens.com/web/viewblog.php?id=15806-goose-egg-hatching
Things were pretty steady with temps and humidity.....

Sorry for your bad experience, I always let geese hatch their own eggs except when I want a new breed and then I go with goslings

 

[gocrow77]

Well, dangit I will maybe have to see what is available at Jacob's Cave in June then. I thought we were doing so well to have a baby make it that far on our first try. I know Jameson will be disappointed, but maybe he will be cheered up a bit if he knows mom is "on the lookout".

 

[banter]

Sorry you had a bad experience for your first hatch. Goose eggs are trickier to hatch, and there are many factors that affect the hatch. My guess is that the egg had a mishap along the way, froze, got too warm, bumped, too long in the egg, turning, cooling....so many things could have happened-not your fault. I am learning all the time. Last year I incubated an odd shaped egg and got a little hunchback gosling. This year I incubated a very small egg from a pair with a large gander. It hatched a very healthy goose with one leg that looks like it was tied in a knot-otherwise perfectly normal. the developing embryo just didn't have enough room! Goose eggs need a lower humidity to start, they need to lose enough of a percentage of their weight to have a fairly large air space at hatching-at least a third of the egg. They need to be turned 2-3 times a day-end over end preferable. The last 3-4 days they should not be turned as the gosling needs to position itself to pip. You should gradually raise the humidity at this time. After pipping 70-80%
humidity is good-the gosling may take 24-48 hours to hatch and must not have the membrane dry out and get rubbery, or it will get stuck. I am finding many gosling need the egg
cracked at the large end to help them out of a very hard shell-but that's another thread! Geese are wonderful and the goslings are so much fun-please try again!