Monday, May 16, 2011

Dead Goose

It happens on the "farm." Things die. We try our best, but it's part of life too.

My husband found our goose (who'd been sitting on 7 eggs for the past 3 weeks!) dead in her pen today. We believe she was attacked by fire ants internally. (Not the way I'd choose to go, given the choice.) He disposed of her body and move the eggs to the incubator.

We'll see how it goes. I believe the hatching rate for artificially incubating goose eggs is 40%. They have to be sprayed with or dunked in water everyday and turned between 3 and 24 times per day by hand until day 27. We believe she started sitting  April 26. That makes today day 21. It's too bad she couldn't have just waited a week or so until they hatched. (Ok, that sounds really cold, sorry, but the eggs probably would have done better with her care than mine.)

I'll keep you posted and let you know how many hatch.

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