How many ganders per goose

Slow air movement ensures complete distribution of air over all parts of the egg to maintain uniform and equal evaporation. Experiments in France, using eggs in eighteen incubators, have substantiated the need to place eggs horizontally see Table 1. Thoroughly clean and sanitise all incubator trays and incubators when not in use. Note: A respiration mask fitted with a suitable gas cartridge filter should be used in the presence of formaldehyde.

The sex of day-old goslings can be identified in a similar manner to that used for chickens, by examining the vent.

Sexing of day-olds is best left to a qualified chicken sexer, as an inexperienced person may damage the sexual organs. With experience, day-old goslings can be identified by holding the legs firmly between the first and second fingers of the left hand, with the neck between the third and fourth fingers and the breast away from you.

Then press gently with the left thumb on the abdomen while at the same time pressing down on the tail with the thumb and forefinger of the right hand. Do this quickly to remove the contents of the bowel, making examination easier. The vent is then everted by pressing gently down on the abdomen with the thumb of the left hand near the vent. Simultaneously place the first finger and thumb of the right hand close together on the opposite side of the vent and slowly separate with a gentle but firm pressing motion, stretching and everting the cloaca to expose the penis if the gosling is male.

Mature birds that is, birds over the age of 7 months can be identified by physical examination. The identification is made easier if two people are available. One method of exposing the penis is by pushing back the tail towards the head with one hand and exerting a steady downward pressure on the abdomen with the other.

The vent will then be everted and the organ exposed. The penis, spiral shaped and white, is just over 1 cm long in immature birds but up to 4 cm long in mature ganders.

The illustrations of the exposed reproductive organs of an immature male, a mature male and a maturing female will assist in sex identification:. The characteristics listed in Table 2 may also help you to distinguish sexes:. Mark birds according to their sex using leg bands, web punching, or wing bands.

Egg production, incubation and sex identification of geese. If you can't find any kind of goose feed at the feed store, you can feed the birds baby chick starter or a duck or waterfowl starter feed. Give them all they want, at all times for the first three to four weeks of age. Keep the birds out of the feeders to keep feed from being wasted. Chick starters may result in leg trouble for the young goslings; because they grow so much more rapidly than chicks, their food requirements are different.

This is why they must get outside to forage. If at all possible if it is warm and not raining get the young goslings outside during the daytime. They need this opportunity to pick up some bugs and grass to help properly balance their ration. Very young goslings should not be left out in the rain because they become waterlogged: their down soaks up water, and their tiny legs can't support the added weight. Some say they have "drowned"! After they develop feathers, waterlogging is no problem.

In spite of the fact that there has been no selective breeding done with geese, they do grow more rapidly than most other birds. It is not unusual for them to weigh 10 pounds in 10 weeks on commercial feeds.

In the late s, E. After starting the goslings for three to four weeks on chick starter and grass, he turned the birds out to a bluegrass pasture that was at least six to eight inches long.

He also made sure that the birds had clean water and whole or very coarsely cracked corn feed for energy. The grass, bugs and soil provided necessary protein, minerals and vitamins. These birds did not grow as rapidly as they would have on a well- balanced commercial feed; however, the feed cost was relatively low.

If you wish to try this way of feeding your geese, an evening feeding of a little mash or three weeks of cracked corn and starter mash mixed together in equal parts will make the shift to the pasture and corn diet easier. Geese will eat a lot of grass, and are sometimes used to weed crops like strawberries, asparagus and sugar beets, as well as orchards, because they will eat most weeds. When strawberries start to ripen, however, geese should be moved out of the patch so they will not eat or ruin the ripe berries.

Older geese may damage the crop by walking on the plants. Drinking water should also be available to keep the young geese cool. The birds will do a better job of weeding if they are hungry - a very light evening feeding of grain whole corn is sufficient. Young females approximately one year old will lay eggs. They will produce better the second and third year. Numbers of eggs will vary widely per female—from 10 to 60 eggs per season.

In the northern part of the United States a flock will start to lay eggs in late March and stop in June. The females will begin producing eggs in about 30 days after lighting them. For your small breeder flock, a pelleted chicken breeder or layer mash will be adequate, if the birds have access to the outside. The ganders males will be much more active and better breeders after the first year of age.

Geese can be very selective of mates. Many large flocks use one gander to three to five females. You may run into fertility problems with a flock of two ganders and five to ten geese. It may be necessary to have several ganders available so that each female can select one that suits her.

How do you kill and dress a goose? Tie the legs firmly together and hang the bird over a rafter in the garage or over a tree limb.

With the feet up in the air and the head down at waist level or higher you must cut the jugular veins. There is a jugular vein down each side of the neck. It is common for the bird to flop its wings, so you may want to confine its body in a burlap bag. JavaScript is disabled. For a better experience, please enable JavaScript in your browser before proceeding. You are using an out of date browser. It may not display this or other websites correctly.

You should upgrade or use an alternative browser. How many female geese should you have per gander? Sort by date Sort by reaction score. Dec 2, 28, 43 Canada. The subject pretty much says it all! I have heard anything from 1 to 4 females to one male. It is easiest during the first breeding season if they were raised with multiple females, they will tend to accept more than one as a mate.

Once they have made up their pairs or trios it is hard to add or switch the geese around. They get attached! It also depends on the breed somewhat. May 13, 3, 32 Petersburg,NY. Quote: That's good to know Denninmi Songster 10 Years. Jul 26, 1, 35 What's got me bothered is that I have the opposite situation -- 3 hatched and survived well, this long, going on 2 months for the oldest , but I've got one goose and 2 ganderlings.

Is THAT situation going to be trouble when puberty hits? Mar 28, 2, 28 Central NC. Quote: YEP they will fight until one proves to be dominate. He gets the goose and usually won't share. I had hoped for the other way around, 2 geese and 1 gander. I guess maybe I should work on finding a second goose?

Sep 14, 23, Adair Co. Some sites say you can have geese per gander depending on the breed. However, the problem you can come into having so many geese is if the gander chooses a mate. A friend had this problem this past spring. She had a pair of pilgrims who were 2 years old then she had 2 yearling geese she kept from the pair's eggs last year. All 3 girls started laying, but only the 2-year-old's eggs were fertile.

The gander paid no attention whatsoever to the 2 younger geese. I have 11 geese for next year, 10 embdens and 1 chinese oops! As far as my sexing is concerned, I have 5 embden pairs. The chinese 'should' be a female, but I'll have to wait and see.