Goose egg rescue

[Birdsarelife]

Me and my friend found an abandon Canadian goose egg at a pond. We brought it home and are going to try incubating it. If you have any advice for hatching Canadian geese eggs then that would be much appreciated! We don’t know much about hatching geese eggs so if y’all could tell us about anything that might be important for it. Thank you!

 

[Huntmaster]

Me and my friend found an abandon Canadian goose egg at a pond.

How do you know it was abandoned?

It was laid today

Must not have been abandon if you know it was just laid today.

You are in the states, yes? Canadian geese are protected by the MBA, so it is technically illegal.

We are still going to try incubating it just in case because it’s better than doing nothing.

Doing nothing by not taking the egg to begin with would have been best case.

 

[Huntmaster]

Thank you so much! very helpful! Two Sebastopol eggs! My neighborhood has an HOA that doesn’t allow poultry, so I’m giving the abandoned and Sebastopols to my friend!

So now you want to bring your friend into your misdoings possibly causing legal problems for your friend. Hopefully they have permits and are legal rehabbers.

 

[killmak]

Toss the egg. There is no point hatching a single goose egg that isn't even partially incubated. Sure if you came across one that was close to hatching I would consider it. But hatching a random goose egg you found on the road thinking you saved it is silly. A lot of people here eat fertilized chicken eggs and we are not killing a baby by eating the unincubated egg.

All of that is not thinking about the legal part. What you are doing is illegal. Just because you feel like you are doing something good does not make it legal. Raising a goose that you legally can't keep is cruel. The baby will bond with you and won't learn natural behaviours. Just throw the egg out, it is just an egg, not a baby.

 

[shmooborp]

1. It was in the middle of the road when we found it
2. What mother lays an egg in the middle of the road? Also there were lots of nests with goose eggs in it.
3. I looked up the rules and regulations for Colorado and it said ‘you’re allowed to take birds if you helping to rehabilitate it or if abandoned or injured’
4.there were kids in the road and cars that were driving, so if we didn’t grab it, it could have been crushed.

Interesting. Your intro post simply said you and your friend found it at a pond. The road seems like pertinent information.
While you may be able to help the birds themselves when in danger, in the state of Colorado you do need a permit to even handle a Canadian goose egg. You may be able to acquire this through the fish and wildlife department.

 

[SilverBirds]

What do you plan on doing with the gosling if it hatches? Looking at your older posts it appears you are in an HOA. Geese are very noisy and it may give you away.

 

[Altairsky]

My neighborhood has an HOA that doesn’t allow poultry, so I’m giving the abandoned and Sebastopols to my friend!

Toss the egg. If you can't keep the bird and you can't be responsible for it, toss it. I'm a bird rehabber and I volunteered for my local wildlife association. Rehabbing a captive born goose is extremely difficult and I personally wouldn't do that. I had to deal with a few captive born and hand fed wildlife that the owners abandoned as soon as they became sexually mature, and those poor things were so messed up in the head that they could never be released. They had to spend the life in a cage all alone because all they wanted to do was mating with human feet and human hands.

 

[SilverBirds]

Since there is no visible development I wouldn't attempt to incubate it. It's technically illegal, and if you were to successfully hatch it you'd need to turn the gosling over to a rehabber.

 

[SilverBirds]

Where we live it is not illegal. It is actually recommended that we help an abandoned egg. It was laid today so there is no development.

You are in the states, yes? Canadian geese are protected by the MBA, so it is technically illegal. Even still, there isn't anything to "save", so I don't see the point of hatching it. You'd end up with a lone gosling, which isn't recommended, and I don't really think you'd be able to give it the care it needs to return back to the wild.

 

[SilverBirds]

There’s something I like to use called canceling, which helps you know what stage and egg is in.

OP said above that the egg was fresh, and you can see in the candled picture there is nothing in the egg. It was probably the start of a gooses clutch.