My 3 Pet Geese...Sweetness, Fights and Bullying [with pics]

[StephieC]

Hello

thank you for posting with such long details the story about your 3 geese! It is one amazing story and thank you for taking the trouble to share it, i enjoyed reading it very much, and the video too!

We have 3 geese ourselves, it started that we didn't know what sex they were, (they were cream-brown Brecon Buffs geese) and they ended up being 3 ganders. One developped a really high aggressiveness, yet he wasn't the boss of all 3. The boss was a beautiful gander which I called Mais and 3toes sometimes fought with him (we called him 3toes as he had one extra toe on his web which was a bit strange). We sold one of the ganders on the Internet, and the aggressive 3toes had to be put down this winter as he was limping very badly and looked very nervously damaged - we don't know what by. Maybe there was something wrong with him in the first place.

We got Mais 2 young domestic-white geese which we bought as female, or so they are meant to be. Mais was very happy to look after them(they were hardly feathered when they arrived) and they have grown up to adult geese. They will be 1 year old this spring, and we still don't know if they are truly females or not. One of htem is rather shorter than the other, and the other is being again aggressive, and having a go at us (and me who spend a lot of time with them) and we don't know why she developped this aggressiveness, suddenly. Our problem is not they bully each other; the smaller goose is definitely a shier goose and keeps out of the way from fights and things and doesn't hiss much. This second white could be a gander - I don't know how we can find out.
But our problem is they bully the chickens very badly, all of them. They seem to hate the chickens and for some reason, if a chicken is around they will get out of their way to chase it, and sometimes they have caught some of their feathers which is very upsetting.

Even Mais chases them, despite me explaining to him that he shouldn't do so as they chickens aren't there to harm him. I love that gander, he has been slowly kinder to me than the original previous ganders had been. He talks a bit like yours, in an intelligent manner, and lets me stroke him and will follow me in the house or in the cottage if I am cleaning up after guests have left. He used to do to me something rather funny and odd last year when the others were here, some behaviour which I wondered if it was like a mating sort of behaviour. He would pretend he is looking for something on the ground with his beak, then look at me, then put his head up looking at the sky and shake it whilst opening and closing his beak, it was ever so funny. He stopped doing that to me when we got the 2 new white geese.

He is such a darling and thankfully his behaviour hasn't changed too much towards me, he has not turned aggressive or odd, and even though he gets scared of new people and tries and bite them and hisses, it is only a passing temper.
Yesteday, a new guest arrived and I showed him the geese as he loves animals and geese and chickens; he approached them very gently and at first Mais didn't peck him, but eventually he did and then started spreading his wings, and the stupid agressive white goose started to have a go at me as well!! She soon stops if I catch her and hold her, she goes into a sort of torpour where she just stares and doesnt attempt to bite or escape. Maybe it is a state of shock.

The 3 of them stay usually together, and I just love how Mais will reply to me if I make a goose call (my weak imitation ;-) and will come and find me if I come out of the house. I am a little worried that those 2 geese are ganders again, but we should find out in the next months if they lay in their first year.

Ours love the pond, and they get very upset when it gets frozen up as it has done lately (we live in Wales, Uk) . Maybe indeed as someone suggested, your geese need a bit of a paddle? A baby swiming pool could do, or something similar where they can immerse their head. When it was frozen I got them a large flexi Tubrug bucket and the agressive one kept on wanting to go inside, would not fit and spill it everywhere! I wish i could find out what they are... Sigh.

I hope you get yours sorted, if you had a vet friend they could tell you what they are maybe (we have no vet friend here and don't fancy paying £40 to find out what each of them are).

Mine love apples and bread, and will get very excited if I throw some at them (I never feed them by hand as with chickens because they seem to be very long-sighted and tend to peck my hand instead of the food, which hurts...)

Well, this is just sharing my experience with geese and probably not a lot of help to you, but it has been lovely to share this with you and to read yours!

Alexandra

Hi Alexandra,

It gave me great pleasure to read about your geese
Such a lovely story!!
your Mais sounds a lot like my Guardian
He's the sweetest boy ever!! Now, he must've learned that I like to cuddle him
so when I approach holding my arms forward, he would stop and let me cuddle him
he would run his bill in my hair as some kind of response, he never bites me when I cuddle him

Couple months ago, Guardian "mated" with Milk and now they do everywhere together
Guardian looks after Milk all the time and stops Sugar from bullying her
Milk has also gradually built up her confidence again

I swear I've seen Guardian tried to climb onto of Sugar to "mate"
at least twice
but both times, Sugar resists and chase Guardian off
still no idea what Sugar is....maybe a She-Male...HAHAHAHAHA~~~

We live in South Devon, so it's not that far from u
there are probably more farm shops around here and I'm sure I'm seen a sign for a local vet somewhere
but I don't fancy spending £??? just to find out what gender they are

Really lovely to have read about your geese
I posted a newer thread recently...don't know where it went, but it was probably titled as "snowy goose babies"
u can still that Guardian still loves to pose for pictures

Happy Geese Keeping ^_^

 

[Alexandra1]

South Devon!! not far at all! I thought most were from USA on the site and never thought to look - nice to know you are near!

There are not many geese farms around here, the person who bought the 3d gander from us had 4 female geese (he bought one of them as a gander and she started laying eggs for him) and he was desperate to get a gander for them! He had 2 Brecon Buffs and one American Buff, it is him who told us our geese were not true Brecon because their weren't pink enough, but he took him anyway. He wanted to take Mais but I told him he couldn't have that one, he could have the one with the funny toe or the medium one who had a nice temper. He thought Mais was the most stunning one. I thought so too ))
Anyway, surely he doesn't need 3 female geese...I might bribe him into selling me one, a real female who lays eggs!

I have never seen Mais trying to mate with any of the white geese, though I think he is telling me his frustration with his funny neck and head business. I did a video earlier but don't know how to make it small enough for uploading.

I will search for your newest post, have you incubated or did it happen naturally? I am glad Sugar isn't bullying so much and the other one is getting her confidence back! Maybe he is a dodgy she-male indeed. Like our hissing lady, she is probably a she-male too! Oh they had a go at the chickens earlier when I fed them mealworms (the chickens go mad for live mealworms, I get them on the internet, about £14 a kilo plus delivery, it helps them beat the winter nothings-to-scratch season). As soon as I did, the jealous geese came and made an end to the worm party by flying in and pecking at whoever was closest to them! I don't know what happens in their head, it has been ages I want to get an animal psychic on them but it does cost a lot, like the price of 2 geese at least, so it seems a bit not worth it... Shame, they do amazing work with pets.

It's great to read you, lovely to hear the stories and that he never pecks you too. Funny how the female are much less bold. Mais is honking in his shed at the minute, there is a lot of honking in the middle of the night recently, I wonder what they are up to, but I guess they don't do that at night - I was hoping but probably not. If you hear of a true lady to sell a bit closer to us...

 

[StephieC]

South Devon!! not far at all! I thought most were from USA on the site and never thought to look - nice to know you are near!

There are not many geese farms around here, the person who bought the 3d gander from us had 4 female geese (he bought one of them as a gander and she started laying eggs for him) and he was desperate to get a gander for them! He had 2 Brecon Buffs and one American Buff, it is him who told us our geese were not true Brecon because their weren't pink enough, but he took him anyway. He wanted to take Mais but I told him he couldn't have that one, he could have the one with the funny toe or the medium one who had a nice temper. He thought Mais was the most stunning one. I thought so too ))
Anyway, surely he doesn't need 3 female geese...I might bribe him into selling me one, a real female who lays eggs!

I have never seen Mais trying to mate with any of the white geese, though I think he is telling me his frustration with his funny neck and head business. I did a video earlier but don't know how to make it small enough for uploading.

I will search for your newest post, have you incubated or did it happen naturally? I am glad Sugar isn't bullying so much and the other one is getting her confidence back! Maybe he is a dodgy she-male indeed. Like our hissing lady, she is probably a she-male too! Oh they had a go at the chickens earlier when I fed them mealworms (the chickens go mad for live mealworms, I get them on the internet, about £14 a kilo plus delivery, it helps them beat the winter nothings-to-scratch season). As soon as I did, the jealous geese came and made an end to the worm party by flying in and pecking at whoever was closest to them! I don't know what happens in their head, it has been ages I want to get an animal psychic on them but it does cost a lot, like the price of 2 geese at least, so it seems a bit not worth it... Shame, they do amazing work with pets.

It's great to read you, lovely to hear the stories and that he never pecks you too. Funny how the female are much less bold. Mais is honking in his shed at the minute, there is a lot of honking in the middle of the night recently, I wonder what they are up to, but I guess they don't do that at night - I was hoping but probably not. If you hear of a true lady to sell a bit closer to us...

The person who bought a gander from u, he sure knows how to pick, eh~
I would never part with my Guardian
everybody says ganders are mean and aggressive, but he really is the sweetest thing

he does chase & bite strangers (& my sister, haha), never me
Sugar is definitely the smartest tho, when Guardian tries to chase my sister, Sugar would try to stop Guardian
sometimes by telling him off (in their local goose dialect), sometimes by nipping Guardian's wing feathers
Sugar has also stopped and pulled Guardian back by holding onto his wing feathers when Guardian tried to chase our next door neighbour once
it's hard to believe until u've actually seen it, but it's 100% true!!

it does make you wonder what's going on in their little heads, right?!
They are just so......"social"
their each individual personalities, their relationships with each other and us the humans, it really is fascinating!!
you are right!, the females are much less bold
Milk also makes sure she stays out of the way whenever Guardian snaps into his hormonal-mode

you should definitely take some pictures and put them up here
I would love to see them~ I bet they look gorgeous too ^_^

PS mine loves apples, lettuce, grapes, watermelon, melons, cabbages, broccoli stalks, pears and cucumbers
absolutely refuse to eat carrots, bell peppers, tomatoes
we go to the local vege wholesaler, sometimes they have veges that are not good enough for selling, we get them cheap
like a pound or two for 30 apples, maybe some bruises on them, no big deal
or other greens too, we just pick off the outer leaves and the geese can have the good parts
I gave Milk a plain popcorn once, she loved it, haha~ but the other two didn't
they go crazy for cooled watermelon in the summer, they'd eat all the rinds too, literally the whole thing
then they get themselves covered in red watermelon juice, it's just so funny!!

 

[Alexandra1]

Here are our 2 white ones, the bossy spitting one and the shy lady.




And an ultra-small picture of him...How did this resize so small!! Videos are uploading, soon!

 

[Alexandra1]

It is funny that you say about Sugar trying to prevent Guardian from pecking at your sister. When the aggressive one was alive, of the same type as Mais, he was being ferocious towards one of us and quite a few times did Mais try to detract him from it, once pulling on his wing and they had a rather heavy fight that time! So I do believe you, there must be plenty intelligence with those birds.
I wish I coIuld communicate with them,,,It is possible to learn.
Funny yours with the water melon! I bet you want to buy them some just for the entertainment of it! I did try them on that last year and they ate it but they weren't extremely fussed. They seem to be fussy eaters, ours.

 

[Alexandra1]

I have uploaded the videos, they are under the Geese thread "
Video of Mais, our Buff gander who likes pecking a bit too much!"


He is gorgeous but doesn't know yet how to pose like your Guardian

 

[StephieC]

Here are our 2 white ones, the bossy spitting one and the shy lady.




And an ultra-small picture of him...How did this resize so small!! Videos are uploading, soon!

Aww........look at them
those gorgeous little faces
your girl goose is so cute with the chubby cheeks!! haha
and it's obviously a girl's face too...very sweeeeeet

I see that line in their chest feathers
ours have it too...I once put my finger in it...their coat is very thick indeed!!

and OMG!! your Mais does it too?!?!
I agree, them geese brains are very clever
I tell other people, they just don't believe that a goose would know to stop another goose from being nasty

I just checked out your video, Mais is very good looking!!
maybe he just needs some practice and he'll find his inner top-model spirit~ haha
do take more pictures of them, they are all so gorgeous

ours are very fussy eaters too
one day, they just suddenly decided they don't like their pellets anymore
and refused to eat any of it
I mixed it in with the corn and barley which they LOVE
but they literally spit out the pellets if they managed to scoop up any with their bill
how naughty!!!
next time the weather is nice, I'll try to take a video of us feeding them treats
it's an absolute delight to watch ^_^

 

[sabringsplenty]

As a young kid we lived in town and had an entire side lot that was fenced in for our whole flock of geese! We moved to the country and had ducks, geese and pigeons. As I grew up we started moving more an more and gad to send all my feathered friends to family/good homes.

It wasn't until now, 18 years later that my husband and I got to a place in our lives that we could settle down and have all the animals we wanted. We have 4 geese....we got the first two from some family that didn't want them, and then got two more as babies from a farm store along with 6 guinea fowl.

I absolutely love my "babies" as I call them. Having raised them from babies, they are super friendly. I can go out and sit in the yard, they crawl all over me, sit in my lap, tug at my clothes, try to eat my jewelry.

I would recommend getting an even number of birds. Mine kind of pair off, and from what I remember as a kid, they split off into little groups.






We have a fenced in back yard that they go out in during the day then in their room in the barn at night.
LOOOVE THEM! Re-living my childhood. =)

 

[Miss Lydia]

As a young kid we lived in town and had an entire side lot that was fenced in for our whole flock of geese! We moved to the country and had ducks, geese and pigeons. As I grew up we started moving more an more and gad to send all my feathered friends to family/good homes.

It wasn't until now, 18 years later that my husband and I got to a place in our lives that we could settle down and have all the animals we wanted. We have 4 geese....we got the first two from some family that didn't want them, and then got two more as babies from a farm store along with 6 guinea fowl.

I absolutely love my "babies" as I call them. Having raised them from babies, they are super friendly. I can go out and sit in the yard, they crawl all over me, sit in my lap, tug at my clothes, try to eat my jewelry.

I would recommend getting an even number of birds. Mine kind of pair off, and from what I remember as a kid, they split off into little groups.






We have a fenced in back yard that they go out in during the day then in their room in the barn at night.
LOOOVE THEM! Re-living my childhood. =)

They are beautiful,

 

[livininbrazil]

Here are our 2 white ones, the bossy spitting one and the shy lady.




And an ultra-small picture of him...How did this resize so small!! Videos are uploading, soon!

Hi, how are your geese doing? I love your photos...I used to live in Dorset, born in Somerset. Takes me back.