Among all species of poultry, geese are at a premium. From breeding chickens, as a rule, the owners have high hopes for eggs, while geese are kept for the sake of tasty and juicy meat. It is not as dietary as chicken, due to its high fat content, but also includes useful trace elements, including vitamins of groups A, B and C. It is also suitable for replenishing iron, zinc, manganese in the body. But it is worth considering that feeding geese is not one of the easiest, but at the same time not one of the most difficult. However, you can definitely say - all this is worth the effort!
Accommodations
Geese prefer to live in company, and therefore breeding of birds must begin with at least 2 individuals. From birth, goslings get used to each other and will not accept a stranger in their environment. Chicks are usually kept in small drawers or cages. However, this place is enough for them only for a few days - goslings grow quickly and require a larger room.
And since mostly chicks spend time on the floor, you should take care to create comfortable conditions for them:
- There should be a dry litter, which should be changed daily.
- Ventilate the room with birds, avoiding drafts.
- Maintain the required room temperature.
- Lighting should be at least 10-15 during the day.
As for the size of the corral, here it is worth considering the number of special in the pack. In crowded places, birds will feel bad, become ill, and their growth and development will slow down. Therefore, it is important that the birds feel spacious. In addition, there should be a place for walking nearby. This is especially important for growing geese at home, as is feeding.
Adult geese can walk in severe frosts, as they are already protected from the cold by fatty deposits. In the summer, they can be let out to graze on the meadow. However, the area should be fenced. Poultry, although heavy and fly in rare cases, but may not resist the call of nature. If necessary, they can find a way out.
What is included in the geese menu
Farmers holding geese need to adjust the diet of these birds depending on local conditions. Just do not rely on how this is done in many poultry farms. The menu of this bird is significantly different from feeding other representatives of the domestic flora and fauna. The lack of grain in no way affects their development - they feel great and grow.
Nevertheless, there are certain standards on the norms for the cultivation and feeding of geese at home, which is highly recommended not to be ignored during their feeding. For the proper development, growth and health of large birds, it is necessary to provide them with fresh herbs. But before you make up the menu, you should decide what exactly should be included in the diet of geese. In this case, a different group of birds should correspond to their diet and the food that is given to small birds is not suitable for laying hens.
Like any animal, geese also need the necessary amount of protein, fat and carbohydrates. Grain and grass serves as the main source of carbohydrates, including a number of vegetables - potatoes, beets, carrots. In one day, the bird is able to eat about 2 kg of greens, from 100 to 150 grams of grain and up to 1 kg of vegetables.
In addition, proteins that are essential for weight gain and active growth play an important role. Their birds can draw from products of plant and animal origin. Most protein is found in legumes. When feeding ducks and geese, it is worth paying attention to oilcake of various oilseeds - it also contains a considerable amount of protein.As for animal products, it is better to give preference to fish and meat and bone meal, cottage cheese, skim milk, sour milk.
Fats are present in cereals, bran, meal and meal of sunflower, flax, soybean, cotton. The need for fats is not very large and the usual daily diet is enough to satisfy it. In this case, the energy value of the daily diet should be equal to from 800 to 900 kcal.
Grass
Green food is the basis of the diet of geese, and most of it includes the use of grass. One has only to release the birds for free grazing, as they themselves will find a suitable feeding for themselves. For full development, each adult goose needs to eat up to 2 kg of fresh grass. Therefore, it is desirable that there is a large meadow near the house where the birds will feel comfortable and not deny themselves food.
If the peculiarities of care and feeding of geese at home do not include pasture, then geese from the garden, herbs, tops can replace the green of the geese. Poultry simply adore lupine, alfalfa, clover, but will not refuse if you give them peas, beans, lentils.
Compound feed
With the help of compound feed and grain mixtures, poultry feeding will be much more efficient and faster. In any agricultural store you can buy special balanced food for geese. As a rule, such a product is sold in the form of granules, due to which the digestion process is greatly simplified.
However, compound feed can be prepared independently, for which it is better to use ground grain. In its entirety, it is poorly digested in the stomach of birds. Cereals that are great for feeding geese are corn, oats and wheat. At the same time, corn should be grinded, and oats should be steamed. Wheat is served as bran. You can improve the taste of the feed by using yeast or pre-steamed grain flour, and then mix it wet with greens.
Usually, feeding geese with compound feed is dry. But if industrial feeding is replaced by a grain mixture prepared independently, minerals and vitamins should be added.
Water
We should not forget about water, because everyone who lives on planet Earth needs it. Geese not only drink it, they like to rinse their beak and nostrils at the drinker. For this reason, their contents must be regularly updated with clean water. In addition, it is advisable to place next to a separate tank with river sand or fine gravel. This is important for the full functioning of the digestive system of birds.
If there is a pond nearby the garden plot, then in the summer you can give a slightly smaller amount of feed. In water, birds will catch small crustaceans and be content with algae. Such nutrition will supply them with useful minerals, which will significantly improve the quality of their meat.
Feeding and caring for geese in the summer
In the summer, feeding poultry will not cause any special problems and is less expensive than in winter. From the farmer practically nothing more is required than how to drive the birds to the meadow to graze. In addition, geese are unpretentious to the quality of grass.
Many farmers try to feed poultry in the evenings. This allows you to tame them in time to return to the pen. A sample menu may look like this (taking into account one goose per day):
- 100 g of barley, oats or a grain mixture;
- 30 g whole or chopped corn;
- 45 g of wheat or rye bran;
- 3 g lentils, peas, beans;
- 20 g of herbal flour;
- 400 g of sugar beets;
- 100 g of boiled potatoes;
- 8 g of shells with chalk and feed fat.
It is worth considering that the necessary 2 kg of grass are geese able to collect on the pasture and therefore a large number of summer feeding is not needed.
But it should also be understood that the weight gain of the geese depends not only on the maintenance and feeding of the geese, the selected breed of birds is also a key factor. Some representatives have enough grass in the pasture, while others need additional feeding.
Although geese are not very demanding on herbs, they do not like some of them. These include sedge and goose cinquefoil. And if such plants are present in the meadow, then the birds will simply avoid such places. But wild and domestic grasses of the family of cereals in geese are at a premium. But most of all they give preference to young shoots - they eat such weed faster, which is only good. For its intensive growth, you should manually mow the meadow regularly.
Features of the winter diet
How to feed geese in such a cold season? In winter, the maintenance of birds is complicated by the fact that it is impossible to release them into the pasture for obvious reasons. Although geese are not demanding regarding food, they should be provided with proper nutrition for quick weight gain.
In particular, feeding geese in winter implies the presence of various kinds of grains on the bird menu:
- barley;
- maize;
- oats;
- millet.
Important! It should be noted that corn in any form (whole grains or cereals) is a fairly high-calorie product, and therefore it is not recommended to overfeed it.
The basis of the diet in winter is cereals and root crops. Geese are fed mainly with barley, oats, wheat, corn. Among vegetables, these are potatoes and beets. Moreover, potatoes or their cleaning is better to pre-cook. It is also necessary to monitor the condition of this root crop - it is better not to give the overgrown tubers or with green patches to the birds, as this is detrimental to them. This is due to the content of solanine, and this is poison for poultry.
Beets, on the contrary, are allowed in raw form, only it should be chopped first. Menu of geese in the winter:
- 40 to 50 g of corn;
- 25 g bean culture;
- 60 g of bone and fish meal;
- 50 g of herbal flour;
- 20 g of needles or coniferous flour;
- 5 g of yeast;
- 5 g of cottage cheese or eggs;
- 80 potatoes;
- 250 g of beets;
- 10 g of chalk with shells;
- 2.5 g of phosphate flour;
- 1.5 g of salt.
In this case, the feeding of geese should be at least three times a day. It is also necessary to ensure that food with water is not very cold. You can pre-dilute the yeast, add them to the feed and set in a warm place for an hour. Fermentation will begin, resulting in lactic acid, which will be useful to geese.
The need for vitamins with the advent of winter increases. Therefore, you should also stock up on mixed feed. And since there are not many useful minerals in feeding, it is for this reason that yeast is included in the diet. They contain vitamins of group B.
When composing a geese menu, it is recommended to pay attention to the silo. This is a special preparation of grass and vegetable tops, in which all useful properties are preserved. Silo is able to fully replace pasture feeding. Also, with its help, birds will be able to supply their body with all the necessary vitamins.
Feeding the geese at home for beginner farmers
It is known that for the full development of geese you need a balanced diet. But how can one understand whether the diet is correct in poultry? Farmers will be informed about this by the appropriate behavior of waterfowl. And if we take into account the absence of any disease in geese, then the following manifestations can serve as true signs:
- Intestinal upset in young animals. The reason may lie in the excess of green food and water. Limit the amount of greens, partially replacing it with porridge or dry yolk. Drinking rate is also recommended to lower.
- Coughing and shortness of breath. This can be caused by improper feeding of geese at home (abuse of dry flour feed by birds). Immediately reduce the amount of food while increasing the moisture content of the feed. Nearby it is recommended to install additional feeders with moistened sand or shell rock - birds will clean their esophagus on their own.
- In severe cases, it is necessary to forcibly fill them with water. Then, during the day, the bird should be given vegetable or hard food, and after that the food is kept in the usual mode.
- Feeding grass in the pasture, geese are usually able to recognize dangerous plants and avoid them. But this applies more to adults, young animals can feast on the leaves of a hemlock or nightshade. And since these herbs are poisonous to geese, you should be vigilant. But if poisoning has occurred, you should give the bird a plentiful drink or gastric lavage.
- Indigestion. This disease is also associated with feeding the geese at home and can be caused by silt, shells and fish, which birds catch in the water. Together with them in the stomach of birds are infectious pathogens, to which their immunity is unusual. Often this happens during the very first water geese walking. In this case, the use of antibiotics is necessary. Subsequently, a protective reaction to such pathogens will develop in birds.
Accepting all these recommendations, one can not only detect any inconsistencies in a timely manner, but also take the necessary measures in a timely manner.
How to feed a broodstock
In the normal period, in the absence of mating and egg laying, birds feed the same way as everyone else. However, those representatives who were selected for procreation must be monitored more closely so that they do not gain excess weight. Obese mummies rush badly. And this also applies to gander - they lose the ability to fully fertilize eggs.
About a month before the laying of the eggs, the female geese feeding ration changes towards enhanced nutrition, with the inclusion of vitamins in the feed. An approximate daily diet for breeding females could be:
- compound feed or grain - from 220 to 250 g;
- animal products (cottage cheese, bone meal, sour milk) - from 25 to 30 g;
- the amount of succulent feed (root crops, silage) - 500 g.
It is mandatory to add yeast and mineral supplements. The presence of milk and bone meal in the diet is very important, as this avoids the lack of protein in the body of a goose. Otherwise, the consequences will be undesirable - the female will begin to peck eggs and eat her offspring.
As for males, their standard daily diet for feeding geese should be expanded with an additional menu:
- germinated grains - 100 g;
- carrots - 50 g;
- curd or testicles - 10 g.
Thanks to this additional feeding, the sexual strength of males will increase, which will positively affect the fertilization process. If he eats little, then this will negatively affect the performance of his direct duties.
Kids nutrition
With the nutrition of adults, now everything is clear, but what about the born goslings? You can feed them immediately after they are completely dry. To begin with, they should give eggs or cottage cheese, previously finely chopped. As for greens, from the first day of their life you can treat nettles, swans, ordinary grass.
At the same time, during the first week, goslings should be fed every 2-3 hours, at least. It is also necessary to monitor the drink and change its water more often (chicks love water procedures). For the sake of this, you can add a little potassium permanganate to the drinker to color the water in a faint pink shade and then swimming will be useful.
And when the young is one week old, feeding the geese at home switches to the use of grain and boiled porridge. Eggs at this age are no longer given; instead, peas are introduced into the diet, reverse, sour milk is also a source of protein. In addition, half of the total diet is greens and therefore young animals can be let out in the yard to pinch the grass.
Two-week-old goslings are given a mixture of peas with cereals and herbs. At the same time, the mash should be friable so that the beak and nostrils do not stick. Frequency of feeding - 5-6 times a day.
Monthly goslings can already be transferred to three meals a day. Their diet may be the same as in adults, but adjusted for body weight. Food should be given exclusively fresh, without any hint of mold. If the offspring was obtained from a goose, then she usually looks after her children herself.
Growing young animals in the absence of a mother is quite troublesome and requires increased attention from the farmer when drawing up the correct diet for feeding geese. And this is despite the fact that goslings live in the pen and learn to independently earn their own food.
Tips from experienced farmers
For beginner farmers who are considering the issue of breeding geese, some advice from experienced poultry farmers can help. And above all, it’s worth clarifying how much to keep such a bird at home. As many experienced farmers note, geese should be kept on the farm for no more than 4 months. It takes so much time for the bird to gain weight, reaching an indicator of 3.2 to 3.7 kg. In the future, growth will take place less intensively, and poultry maintenance may become unprofitable.
Lindovsky, Kholmogory and governor geese are the most popular. The latter variety is the youngest breed for effective breeding. In Russia, it was launched in 2011. In just 9 weeks, which is a little more than two months, gander reach 4.35 kg, and geese - 4.00 kg of weight.
Another useful tip is to cross the female and male from different breeds. As a result, a fast-growing young growth will be born, which will develop more rapidly than purebred offspring.
In order to avoid poisoning when feeding goslings, it is necessary to carefully examine the place for their walking. In the spring, before going to the pasture, feed the birds so that they eat less grass. This contributes to a gradual addiction to succulent food.
Total
Growing geese is not as difficult as it might seem at first glance. It is necessary to strictly adhere to certain rules, and then the offspring will fully develop.
In this case, you can choose for yourself any of the options - every spring to buy chicks of weekly age or to establish a broodstock. In each case, there are advantages and disadvantages.