More water for my lovely pet geese

[georgeandmildredgoose]

Hi all,

was hoping to pick your brains about options for my geese. i have a chinese goose and gander, which i have had for only a few months.
they have only ever had access to a baby bath of water (at this home and with the person who had them before). it works well for us, as its easy to empty and re-fill, but thats not the point as im sure the geese would love more water!!

i am unable to provide a stream or large pond due to where we are. what i can do is give them a large human size bath (this was given to me and is not currently being used for anything). i was thinking about half setting it into the ground and creating sloping sides with the dug out soil to provide a ramp to walk up. i guess i would need to put some smooth bricks in the bottom so its not too deep and we also have chickens....would they drown in it?? i could connect up a drainage system to take the water away.

the other option is to source a preformed plastic pond liner, i wouldnt have the issue of it being too deep (providing i can find a shallow one). but what would i do about draining it, to give fresh clean water.

any other thoughts or options ?? would love to hear what you do for your geese

 

[gryeyes]

First, pre-formed pond liners are no more than 18 inches deep; the occasional extra-fancy one can be 24 inches deep,but those are special order items.

I have two kiddie pools, which are not as deep as a pond liner. The ducks and geese love 'em.

But I also have a 300 gallon stock tank. Perfect door submarining, playing bottoms up, and lazily floating without touching bottom with their feet.

Those are my two call ducks in the tank.

Here is a shot of the tank, occupied, and the two kiddie pools.

 

[georgeandmildredgoose]

wow, that looks great bet your birds have lots of fun in the water. how often do you have to change the water? do you just tip them up to empty the kiddie pools?, i think we would get quite boggy if i did that here, i think i would need to be able to direct the water away some how....

thanks so much for taking the time to reply

 

[gryeyes]

Every two or three days, I dump out the kiddie pool water and fill 'em up again. My soil is very loamy, so the water drains quite quickly. Wouldn't matter, though, as the ducks and geese love to bill & drill into the puddles!

The stock tank has a drain on the side at the bottom but I have not drained it yet. 300 gallons may be murky, but still swim-able for a long time. I do add water to replace what the waterfowl splash out, though.

The chickens do drink out of all three. I have a rescue ramp in the stock tank, which I built out of expanded metal grate, but that would be more for squirrels or other critters which might fall into it. I've had chicks fall into the kiddie pools and drown, so I moved all the pools some distance from the coop. By the time chicks are that far from the coop by the kiddie pools, they're older and more able to flap out of 'em. I keep that stock tank as full as possible to prevent anything from having to scrabble up the sides.

I built the rescue ramp after one of my Lakenvelders fell in and couldn't get out, nearly drowning. She was cold and lifeless when I found her, but I managed to save her. (There's an old post about it somewhere, more than a year old, about it... Oh, here it is:
https://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=358207 )