Keeping geese as pets

[Hereward]

I've got chickens at home and would fancy a couple of geese, mainly to serve as pets but with the added bonus of burglar deterrence.

Some questions:

1. Don't they just fly off? I don't want to clip wings.
2. Okay to keep two of the same sex together?
3. What's a good species? I was thinking Chinese or Embden.
4. What about roosting/sleeping? Would a garden shed do?

I have a big garden with plenty of grass and a large pond.

Any tips appreciated.

[jeff m]

Sorry to be negative, I'm sure there will positives to follow.

Say goodbye to any fish in your pond.
They crap a lot..... a lot.

[Sam_68]

jeff m said:

They crap a lot..... a lot.

They are basically just crapping machines.

...the thing with grass is that it's actually pretty hopeless stuff to digest any energy out of. To be able to live on it you have to evolve a digestive system capable of one of three approaches:

• digesting everything thoroughly in a vast multiple-processing chemical plant of a stomach, like cows do.
• bringing stuff back up after a first chewing to chew it again, to break it down a bit more to extract more nutrient out of it, like rabbits (...and cows) do, or;
• Eating a fk of a lot of the stuff, extract the little bit of easily extractable nutrient, then st out the rest in a pretty much constant stream behind you.

Guess which approach geese use?

Oh, and they're noisy bds. You might as well just buy a two-stroke motorbike and spend half an hour revving it up at 5:30 every morning. It will wind your neighbours up to approximately the same degree, but it will st out less noxious substances onto your garden and you can ride it to work in fine weather.

[RedLeicester]

I have about 300 or so here at certain times of the year. You're welcome to them.

ALL OF THEM.


Horrible things, crapmachines like you wouldn't believe and oh so sodding noisy, and damned aggressive too when the mood takes them.

[singlecoil]

And guess where they crap the most? In the pond. Make sure it's easy to clean out unless it's very big.

[RedLeicester]

singlecoil said:

And guess where they crap the most? In the pond. Make sure it's easy to clean out unless it's very big.

On the lawn in our case. Knee deep in the sodding stuff.

[Tacagni]

On a positive note geese are good guards, not too noisey if you get the right breed (not chinese very noisey). Same sex is ok, there good at grazing so should keep your lawn down, they are ok as pets but can be loud sometimes so think of your neighbours if there close (maybe a couple of female's would be ok) Check out our website (click on Toulouse geese) www.churchbankfarm.wordpress.com

[cuneus]

We used to call one of our friends geese Stripe

[anonymous-user]

The best ones are the ones with crispy skin and a nice fruity sauce!

[Hereward]

Crikey, they do seem to polarise opinion!

Can anyone advise how one would prevent them simply flying off on day one. Would they need to be locked in a run for a time to get used to their new surroundings?

Also, what are the ideal sleeping arrangements? I lock my chickens away at night, would it be the same principle for geese? Do geese instinctively return to the coop when it gets dark?

Thanks!

[grumbledoak]

Near crying. Thanks to all. I didn't realise geese were such a PITA.

[ChrisnChris]

I used to have some, evil fkers, don't turn your back on a goose, it'll peck your calf & that hurts especially if it doesn't want to let go
I used to put them away at night, as with the chickens......that was a PITA as well
As has been said, eating & stting machines.

One of them adopted a traffic cone as a mate, every morning when let out it would run full pelt wings flapping to the traffic cone, sit with it all day, wouldn't let anyone anywhere near it...not that you'd want to go near it anyway

[GnuBee]

Hereward said:

I've got chickens at home and would fancy a couple of geese, mainly to serve as pets but with the added bonus of burglar deterrence.

Some questions:

1. Don't they just fly off? I don't want to clip wings.
2. Okay to keep two of the same sex together?
3. What's a good species? I was thinking Chinese or Embden.
4. What about roosting/sleeping? Would a garden shed do?

I have a big garden with plenty of grass and a large pond.

Any tips appreciated.

1. They may try flying at first but the ones we had soon calmed down and just stayed in their (all be it quite large) pen

2. Yes

3. We had Embdens - a mated pair who then successfully raised the spawn of satan; "April"

4. You can probably get away with a shed - they don't "roost" like a chicken does so no perches blah blah

As others have mentioned they do crap a lot but if you're only talking about a pair then it's not difficult to stay in control of.

They don't need a pond as long as they have somewhere they can submerge their heads in/preen etc - ours were quite happy climbing in and out of a horse feeding thing filled with water.

We found they have definite personalities; the original pair were placid and did know us from strangers who would always be treated to a threat/territorial display. The chick they raised however was a bit of character and mostly enjoyed chasing everyone and everything around except for me. The GF gave up going in the pen with them unless she was armed with a dustbin lid.

I'd have geese again in a heartbeat - the geese and pigs were my favourites of all the animals we had.

[Hereward]

Thanks, GnuBee, very useful. They do sound like absolute characters, which is what it's all about.