What happened to my goose babies

Bobcat. 

Gone are Affie, Baby Girl, and my big bitey jerky gander Bitor. I really loved him, for all that he was a bitey jerk. He had one hell of a personality. Sweet Girl passed a couple months ago, and we couldn't find a mark on her.  We figured there must have just been something wrong with her, but perhaps that had been a bobcat too.

Took precautions, weren't good enough. Damn cat came within 30 yards of our house. Don't know why it went after the geese instead of the ducks.  We ended up moving what fowl were left (the 3 ducks) to the pen next to the house.

Hubby went out and bought a furtaker's license and a bobcat card.  We'd determined it was a bobcat due to pics on game cams we'd set out.  Over the first weekend he had it, he got not one... but TWO freaking bobcats.  Both females.  @$#%@#$%#$  A friend of ours is a rather good hobby taxidermist, and we're gonna get his help to cure the pelts. 

I've decided that I won't have any more farm critters that are "pets".  We can't make our critter areas absolutely impenetrable.  Don't ask why or berate that I don't.  It's just not currently feasible, and I'll leave it at that. 


RIP my little goose babies.

 

 

RIP Affie Girl

LJ found Affie dead in the pen this morning. Apparently she was next to the fence, all curled up like she'd normally be for sleep, but missing her head. :( She was my darling girl, and the only one of our original geese that I considered a pet. The very same goose that nearly committed suicide the day we brought her home as a gosling, horking down a piece of shaving that we managed to dislodge before she could choke to death.

Gotta love breaking into tears while at work. Not awkward at all.

I'm heartbroken.

We'll bury her tonight, and I will be beefing up the goose pen by headlamp and putting out game cams to see if we can figure what did it. :(

We'll miss you sweetie pie.

More patient than I am, by far

Baby is still sitting her nest. She has at least 15 under there. On the rare occasion that she gets up, Bitor hovers near the nest to protect it, and often Sweet Girl will go sit on the nest til Baby gets back. Affie, of course, doesn't sit. As far as she's concerned, the other two ladies make perfectly servicable nursemaids, and this way Affie keeps her lovely figure. :)

Me, though... I. Can't. Wait. To. GO HOME! When I left this morning, the two pipped eggs hadn't made any more progress from last night, though both eggs peeped and rocked when I directed the light through the incubator window. According to LJ, a couple hours later before he left the house, both were rocking away, and one had started to unzip the shell (he said it had broken off a large chunk!). I hope the other two non-pipped eggs have also progressed since this morning. One had finally pipped internally (I could hear the clicking breaths), but nothing yet from the other (just some faint movement at the top edge of the air cell). Fingers crossed for some more shell pips, and maybe a couple newly hatched goslings when I get home!

Bitor.... is a studly gander

So, my big mean gander managed to do his part to fertilize some eggs!  Happy dance!

I had been collecting goose eggs, with the intention of putting them back in the nest once I got a good clutch together.  It had been really cold out, and rather than have the eggs freezing in the nest while the girls built up a clutch, I'd been bringing them in and storing them in the back bedroom where the temp stays around 55 deg or so.  I kept only the nice clean eggs, and after a week had 9.  Then, LJ decided to buy an incubator!  So, even though I read that goose eggs are a bit tricky, we decided to break in the new toy with my carefully collected 9.  We put them in on the 12th.  I weighed them all and wrote their weights on the eggs with a pencil, as well as marking one side of the egg with an X, and one with an O.  I've been turning them 3 times a day so that the x's and o's alternate each night as far as which side is up.  So, on Sunday, I candled the eggs (shining a nice bright light into the egg), and FOUR showed development!  Truthfully, I didn't really expect anything out of this experiment, so I'm super stoked.  When illuminated, each egg shows a dark spot with veins radiating out from it.  I tried to take a picture, but it just wasn't working.  So, if I manage to not kill these four goosey miracles, I may (knock on wood) end up with 4 goslings in a little over 3 weeks.  Woohoo!

During the week that these eggs were in the incubator, I continued to collect fresh eggs from the ladies.  They'd originally had two nests in the goose hut, and they finally ended up dismantling the nest on the left and all began sharing the one on the right.  On Sunday I put 5 eggs back in the nest, and crossed my fingers that number of eggs would be enough for one of the gals to start sitting.  Lo and behold, they've all been taking turns on the nest!  I didn't think they did that, but I've seen it.  So, provided they do a good job (fingers crossed!) we may get a naturally hatched batch too.  *knocking knocking knocking on wood*

Wish me luck, because this is my first time incubating!

It's Affie Girl's first time too

And she was such a CUTE baby!