House goose and egg laying questions

[LakeGooseBerry]

Hi everybody.
I have a goose who I hatched last spring and she spends most of her time in the house but recently she has been acting strangely and wants to be outside all the time. Lastnight we found a nest with 11 eggs!! Here are my questions:

(1) Are these the only eggs she will lay this season or will she continue and for how long???

(2) Will she lay eggs all year?

(3) We would like to use the eggs. Should I take all of them away or should I leave some in the nest for her?

(4) She has always slept in a box beside my bed but for the last few nights she has wanted to be outside. We "built" a little shelter around her nest with bales of straw. Should I leave her out since this is where she wants to be? If I leave her out will she become disengaged from us permanently? Will she ever be a house goose again?

 

[Miss Lydia]

Hi everybody.
I have a goose who I hatched last spring and she spends most of her time in the house but recently she has been acting strangely and wants to be outside all the time. Lastnight we found a nest with 11 eggs!! Here are my questions:

(1) Are these the only eggs she will lay this season or will she continue and for how long???

(2) Will she lay eggs all year?

(3) We would like to use the eggs. Should I take all of them away or should I leave some in the nest for her?

(4) She has always slept in a box beside my bed but for the last few nights she has wanted to be outside. We "built" a little shelter around her nest with bales of straw. Should I leave her out since this is where she wants to be? If I leave her out will she become disengaged from us permanently? Will she ever be a house goose again?

Sounds like she maybe going broody and since you don't say you have a gander I wouldn't even take the chance of leaving her outside if she can't be locked up for her protection. Take all the eggs destroy the nest and bring some of the eggs inside give her a large dog crate or something private maybe a closet set up for her to lay in. with some kind of bedding so she'll lay her eggs inside. or let her out just to lay collect all eggs she'll continue to lay most likely through spring my Goose {Toulouse} started laying last year end of Feb and laid an egg every other day till she went broody last of April I let her sit but she didn't hatch. Once they go broody they stop laying. So you can give her a safe place to brood[sit] or just keep taking the eggs and collect and eat them. Their laying season is usually Jan thru May depending on what part of the country your in.

Welcome to BYC

 

[LakeGooseBerry]

Thank you for your reply.

If I collect all her eggs every day will she stop her broodiness? Or will she spend all her time looking for her eggs? She is very restless in the house and she just wants to get outside.
If I destroy her nest won't she just make another place to lay? She wears a diaper in the house so it doesn't work for her to lay inside. These are not fertile eggs but if I bring them inside for her to sit on will this entice her back into the house? She has a big box that she sleeps in at night where she does not wear a diaper. Should I put her and her eggs in there during the day? I feel like I have lost my goose buddy. I'm at a loss.

 

[Miss Lydia]

Thank you for your reply.

If I collect all her eggs every day will she stop her broodiness? Or will she spend all her time looking for her eggs? She is very restless in the house and she just wants to get outside.
If I destroy her nest won't she just make another place to lay? She wears a diaper in the house so it doesn't work for her to lay inside. These are not fertile eggs but if I bring them inside for her to sit on will this entice her back into the house? She has a big box that she sleeps in at night where she does not wear a diaper. Should I put her and her eggs in there during the day? I feel like I have lost my goose buddy. I'm at a loss.

She is growing up lol collecting eggs hasn't done a bit of good here with my ducks or my goose. once they go broody they have to run the cycle Can she get in an out of her box on her own? if so you could try just letting her brood in the house I actually have fake goose eggs for my geese and Muscovy's since we don't have room for any more water fowl they are ceramic and look just like the real thing. when they lay and egg i take the real one and replace it with a fake one usually once they go broody they are sitting on all fake. and usually 2 is enough. or I've left some of theirs until they are sitting 24/7 then remove their eggs that I have left then they really don't care how many eggs they are sitting on as long as they have some. She want's outside because that's where she has laid her eggs and made a nest. So you can try the alternative inside it may work If you can give her a nice quiet place inside where she can come and go [they don't usually get up more than 1X a day once they get completely into brooding you could time it to get her outside for her business ,All my flock are outside so Other than what i do I cannot assure you what ever you do will work but you can't leave her outside she'll be killed by a pred in no time.

 

[LakeGooseBerry]

Thanks so much. I will try to figure something out. It's crazy but I feel a little sad.

 

[Miss Lydia]

Thanks so much. I will try to figure something out. It's crazy but I feel a little sad.

I know how you feel when my goose sat for 28 days last year and lost the only gosling that made it it hatch I was heartbroken for her and myself so we went and found 2 ,day olds brought them home and had them inside for their first 3 weeks they loved us and us them but I knew my goal was to let my 2 adults adopt them so would take them out daily for visits. It took my goose a good 2 weeks to get over losing her gosling I know she heard it in the egg because I did, Her and the gander started to show real interest around the end of second week so I knew I was about to loose my babies.I am so happy for them now that they are a foursome but I miss not being able to snuggle with them like we did when they were goslings. They are now 8 months old and even though they know me as their care taker they have forgot all about our time with them at first. I haven't though it's such a sweet time. So even though I haven't had mine inside since they were 3 weeks old I still kind of know what your feeling. It's hard to see them grow up. Kinda like human kids. lol

 

[LakeGooseBerry]

Thanks again.
I have another question for you since you have so much goosey experience. I have only this one goose and as I said she has grown up in and out of the house. Sometimes she seems fairly bonded to us and other times she seem indifferent. I really cannot have another goose to keep her company and I wonder all the time if she would be happier with a flock. She did have 4 other goslings to romp with for the first few weeks of her life. Do adult geese intigrate into new flocks? Do established flocks accept new adults? If I found a farm with geese that would welcome her in do you think it would be better for her to leave us and join them? ....especailly since she is spending more and more time outside by herself? (entirely her choise...I'd rather she be inside with us)
Maybe she will come back and want to spend time with us again after this broody thing ends, but if it doesn't....

BTY how long will it take to run its course?

 

[Miss Lydia]

Thanks again.
I have another question for you since you have so much goosey experience. I have only this one goose and as I said she has grown up in and out of the house. Sometimes she seems fairly bonded to us and other times she seem indifferent. I really cannot have another goose to keep her company and I wonder all the time if she would be happier with a flock. She did have 4 other goslings to romp with for the first few weeks of her life. Do adult geese integrated into new flocks? Do established flocks accept new adults? If I found a farm with geese that would welcome her in do you think it would be better for her to leave us and join them? ....especially since she is spending more and more time outside by herself? (entirely her choose...I'd rather she be inside with us)
Maybe she will come back and want to spend time with us again after this broody thing ends, but if it doesn't....

BTY how long will it take to run its course?

It will take 28 -30 days just like she was actually going to hatch some goslings. and then I have to make them go outside and lock their house so they can't get back inside till time for bed. This is with my ducks ,when Missy my goose lost her gosling I just let her take all the time she needed to get over her loss. so it was 2 weeks after her 28 day brood. about a month and a half total. Yes geese can fit into a new flock but hopefully if you do decide to let this farm take her they would gradually let her and the established flock get use to each other through a safe pen for her separate from the flock so they can meet and greet but no one can rough her up, she will be the intruder till they all get use to her and her them. But geese do need geese so this maybe the way to go, would you be able to visit? I would diff ask them how they go about integrating a new goose into the flock., since she has only known you as her family it will take more of an effort for her to feel comfortable in a new setting, but I think she would eventually fit in and be happy being with geese since they are flock animals. As far as her wanting to again spend time with ya'll after her broodiness is over, I can't say never having a house goose. I think she would be lonely enough to seek you out . I wish you the best I know this is a hard decision and I think from all you've said you want the best for her. Please let us know what you decide.

 

[The goose girl]

Hi everybody.
I have a goose who I hatched last spring and she spends most of her time in the house but recently she has been acting strangely and wants to be outside all the time. Lastnight we found a nest with 11 eggs!! Here are my questions:

(1) Are these the only eggs she will lay this season or will she continue and for how long???

(2) Will she lay eggs all year?

(3) We would like to use the eggs. Should I take all of them away or should I leave some in the nest for her?

(4) She has always slept in a box beside my bed but for the last few nights she has wanted to be outside. We "built" a little shelter around her nest with bales of straw. Should I leave her out since this is where she wants to be? If I leave her out will she become disengaged from us permanently? Will she ever be a house goose again?

1) Since she's not broody yet, she may continue laying for a while. If you leave all the eggs, she'll soon go broody. If you take the eggs, she may continue laying all Spring.

2) Probably not. I's highly unusual for geese to lay outside of Spring and perhaps a small Fall season. Most geese only lay in Spring.

3) Depends on whether you want her to continue laying or not. If you want her to lay, and you want her to use that nest, leave one egg in the nest so she doesn't consider it unsafe and abandon it to build a new one. You can also leave a fake egg or a golf ball.

4) I'd say let her decide where she wants to be, as long as it's safe for her, predatorwise. Geese are built to forage, and as there's usually not much foraging to do inside a house, they like it better outside most of the time. She's all grown up now, so she's not as dependant on your company as she was when she was younger. She was not a house goose, she was a house gosling. She'll never be a gosling again, but she'll still enjoy your company. Now she needs to to her goose stuff, and most of that takes place outside.

Quote: It seems your goose isn't imprinted on humans, since she's had the company of other geese when she was young. So she'd probably thrive with a flock of geese. All geese love company. Established flocks can accept new adults. There may be difficulties, but that's outside my area of experience.

My own goose is imprinted on humans. She was a house goose when she was younger and slept in my bed. We spent lots of time outside, but she slept in my bed. Then she started laying. She'd built her nest outside in the goose house, and that was where she wanted to lay. For the first few weeks she either laid her egg during the day or she woke me up at night so I could take her outside to the goose house. Then one night she went to lay right before bedtime, so I left her in the goose house all night. And she's been staying there at night ever since - except when we're staying overnight someplace else, then she still sleeps with me.

She's still very much a people goose. She definitely prefers company, but she also prefers to be outside. So I spend hours every day outside with her, and so does her other human caregiver. She likes to come in for a nap a couple of times every day - preferably in my bed. She also spends time alone in the yard, but she can see me through the window most of the time. If she can't, she honks until I come running!

This arrangement is very time-consuming and it wouldn't work if either of us had jobs. If that were to happen, I'd get her a gosling or two (or three

) for company. I know she'd be miserable on her own.

My goose laid a whopping 108 eggs last season. When eggs started to be more than two days apart, we gave her some extra fake eggs in her nest, and she almost immediately started sitting on them. We let her sit for a week to make sure she was done laying, then removed all the fake eggs. She searched for them for about 10-15 minutes and that was it. I don't see any reason to let a goose sit on infertile eggs for a month or more.

 

[LakeGooseBerry]

Fabulous information. I really appreciate your response.
I did take the last 2 eggs away today so we'll see what happens.
This site / forum is so helpful. Thanks a million