New to Goose Keeping HELP!!!

[Chiko]

I've decided to buy some Sebastopol goslings to raise on my own and need some help on how to get started raising them... I know how to raise them as babies but need to know how to keep them going when they get older.

can you give me some tips on how to rear and raise them and if Sebastopol geese are a good begginer goose breed?

 

[jack & mommy's duckies]

I also ordered some sebbie geese for this spring. I can't wait very exciting.

I also have African geese. So here is what i've got set up for them. I built them a house. Just kinda big wooden box 4'x4' for them to sleep in at night. I keep the door open at all times so they can go in and rest or lay eggs. I also have a large pen. I do let them free range alot but I've got dogs that like to eat my birds so when the dogs are out the birds are in. The pen is 20'long by 15' deep. they have a nice big water dish in there and their food. And I always keep treats and stuff in there also.

I use straw as beding for them. The love to root and move it where they want. And about once a week I give them toys to play with. I have a box of stuff that I will toss one or two in a week and keep it new and interesting. Their fav is a dog treat ball. The kind dogs roll on the ground to get treats. I fill it with corn and the geese work and work and scream at it and eat the corn as it comes out.

Also every day I pick up or pet each and every one of my birds. Some are getting to big for me to handle but I want them used to being touched and having me around. I don't like a nasty goose.

Hope this helps

 

[ultasol]

My suggestion? If you want geese you can control during breeding season DO NOT handle them or get them used to touching all the time. Familiarity breeds lack of respect for your space or person, which can lead to more physical protective behavior during breeding season.

This doesn't mean they will be afraid of you, after all, they will have seen you everyday or almost everyday during their life. It will also make it safer and easier for other people to take care of your geese while you are gone.... I had a american buff gander someone 'babied' who got rid of him as an adult because he was 'too aggressive'. He had no respect for personal space. While he LOVED me, and he literally LOVED my husband (he would mate my husband's leg, if he was kneeling down would try to grab his hair and mount his head..) he had no problem grabbing pantslegs, using his wings to beat you, nipping. When I was away for a day and asked my neighbor to peek in on the horses, he chased my neighbor across two acres of pasture.

This was the product of 'babying' a goose. If they aren't as familiar they will still protect their nests and young, it's instinct, but aren't as likely to be as hands on and will be more likely to respect being waved away.

This same advice is given in Holderread's "The book of geese". If you don't own a copy I highly recommend it. Most comprehensive tome of goosekeeping I could get my grubby little hands on.

 

[ultasol]

Oh, and just an FYI, geese are powerful creatures. An incident with the 'tame' American Buff gander after his babies hatched left me, a large adult, with blood blisters on my calves, thighs, and arms, bruises (from wings) on my legs and arms, and bitemarks on my legs and arms in which you could see every indentation in his bill a week after the incident.

I love geese, but I think people might underestimate them and have expectations of them that are unrealistic. Geese are smart, personable, and have very interesting group dynamics unlike those found in ducks or chickens, but they do require different handling and precautions during breeding season. They aren't cute and cuddly little wumpkins incapable of hurting a fly, they are protective of family, nest, babies, mates.

That said, there is nothing like going outside and calling for your geese and having seven large birds come running from across a field to you. They learn quickly, in the summer I would herd them from pasture to pasture and they learned the routine in no time, gathering into a group and following me. All this from geese that were not 'used to handling' or babied.

 

[crazy goose lover]

http://sebastopolgeeselovers.freeforums.org/index.php

Would recomend this web site. Should be able to find everything you need to know and if you don't, feel free to ask questions. It is a very friendly group