Hatching Geese

[littledear]

I have read a great deal of information on incubation and I am currently incubating nine goose eggs in a forced air incubator. I am hoping that I will actually hatch some babies out. My questions are: Will my female geese take the babies once they hatch if I place them in her nest? If my female geese do adopt the young geese do I put special feed out for them?

My eggs are coming from one of my geese that is almost 11 months old and so is the gander. I am assuming that maybe only half are fertile. How long do they need to incubate before I can tell if the egg is fertile? I am on day five right now and I am hand turning the eggs 5X's daily with a temp of 99.5. I let the eggs sit the first 24 hours undisturbed in the incubator before I started turning them. I have all of the water trays full of water for humidity and I spray the eggs when I turn them. Oh I also wash my hands before turning the eggs. Is there anything else I should be doing? Also my incubator ran four 4 days before I placed any eggs inside of it and the temp stayed constant. Thanks for any additional advice.

Littledear

 

[RHRanch]

I think it depends on the goose and the age of the babies and the age of any other babies the goose already has. That said, last year 2 Cotton Patch ganders raised 5 goslings for me. They were fantastic parents. They hovered outside the grower/brooder pen for a couple of weeks before I relented and let them have the babies. They took over, protected them and taught them goose things. I didn't have to use a heat bulb during the day because the ganders kept them warm either in thier wings or out in the sunshine. It was a great experience to see those boys parenting those babies!

 

[DUCKGIRL89]

WOW! I need a goose! lol, I'm so tired of brooding ducklings!.... wait.... do they watch over ducklings?

 

[pete55]

Hi Littledear - best of luck with your eggs. here's a link to hatching and although lengthy it should answer many of your questions.

https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/491013/goose-incubation-hatching-guide-completed

Pete

 

[RHRanch]

My ganders tried to adopt some Call Ducklings last year, but the call ducklings seemed either confused or frightened of the giant geese! LOL My ganders talked and cajoled them, and tried to get them to come to the pool with them (and thier other fat adopted gosling babies) but the Calls ran around randomly and wouldn't get with the group. I think geese can and would take on ducklings, but Calls seem to flighty (dumb?) to be out in the big world with geese. I bet ganders/geese could take care of any standard breed duckling though: Pekin, Muscovy, Runners, Campbells, Swedish, etc

 

[littledear]

Oh wow, that is so wonderful. I will try that with my babies when they hatch out. All of my females are very gentle and love attention. My gander knows that I am bigger than he is but he still acts like he can chase me away and brags to the females. I can't wait to see what they do with little ones as the older ones are just about 11 months old and haven't been around any babies. Thanks for sharing!

 

[littledear]

Thank you Pete. All of your advice has been very helpful. I think I got lucky when my first bunch of eggs hatched out last spring and I am trying to be very careful this year with my eggs. I can't believe how rewarding it is to see the birds hatch and grow. Thanks so much for your advice and time.

 

[pete55]

You're very welcome. I quite agree with you and we too get excited every year as the breeding season approaches and we look forward to hatching the youngsters. Hope you have a great breeding season

 

[littledear]

Pete,

I read through your information on incubation for goose eggs and it has helped me a great deal. I think your information is really good and should be published. I think you should try to get it published as it is very informative and easy to understand and follow. Thank you so much for the help you have given to many with your work.