Housing my geese with my chickens?

[Twizzlebee]

I have a very nice chicken coop, roughly 6 x 12 ft. Well, not nice really. It's older, but it does it's job. They get along just fine with my chickens, minus some minor details. For one they eat all their feed, but I have been putting it up which seems to help, but they also have been playing in the waterer and emptying the 5 gallons entirely overnight. Which is the main issue. Is there anything to do to stop this? My other option is I have a large dog kennel that's fenced in. But the building in there isn't enclosed, so I would be worried about the coons we have around here. Any advice? Please and thanks

 

[jdywntr]

If they are adults and you let them out at a reasonable time in the morning (IE early) they will be fine without water overnight. They need water if they have feed available (the geese not the chickens). I have my chickens, ducks and geese in the same coop. I have a bucket of water and also a traditional chicken waterer that is raised. I am up early (5:30-6 am) so they don't really use the waterers in the coop much unless they are in there during the day.

Try to make an area for the chickens away from the geese. My geese have recently taken to nibbling on the chickens back ends when they have put themselves up for the night.

So, I will be blocking off an area that the geese can't get to. If you do the same, you could put a waterer there.

 

[erinszoo]

We housed our geese with our chickens and ducks when they were under six months. Then our duck started trying to mate our chickens and we had two chickens pulled into the pond and drowned so we separated them. Our ducks went in their own pen and our geese went in their own pen. Their pens are predator proof but they just have lean-to's for housing ... which they almost never use. About the only time they get in their houses are when the neighbors mow and make a lot of noise near the fence or to eat because we keep their food in there. If you want to keep them in the house I would try to make a section that they can't get to so the chickens can get away from them if they need to like was suggested above.

 

[1MrsMagoo]

My special needs chickens live in one of my waterfowl coops with 7 ducks and 6 geese with no issues for the most part. However, their is one important piece of information you didn't tell us: How many geese and are their both males and females?

If you have both sexes, they will pair off and each will claim a nest area and aggressively defend it during mating season. I have to put dividers between my ducks/chickens and geese during breeding season to keep the gander from attacking any poor critter that wanders too close.

As to the dog kennel area....is it on concrete and tall enough to put some sort of top on it (wire, netting, metal roof)? If you have a secure top and bottom, and the fencing is chain-link or heavy wire, then a large dog house, or even one of those plastic dog igloos would work for a shelter. Either that or put in two walls coming out of the corner a couple feet each direction with a roof on it.

As long as the wire area around the geese is secure, their actual housing only needs to be a place to get out of the weather and make a dry nest. If you are worried about raccoons reaching through into the run, then zip tie some wire or hardware cloth (small holes) around the entire bottom up 3 feet anywhere their are no walls or other obstacles blocking their reach.

Good luck!