How to hatch goose eggs – tips, tricks, and troubleshooting

Want to hatch goose eggs? Or do you have a broody goose sitting on a pile of eggs? Read on to learn what to expect, problems that may arise, and the benefits of letting momma goose do the incubating for you!

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When do geese lay eggs?

First things first: you should know when to expect goose eggs and goslings. Domestic geese will only produce eggs for a relatively short time window in the spring, although laying season can begin earlier in warmer climates. 

How long does it take for goose eggs to hatch?

Goose eggs can take anywhere from 28 to 35 days to hatch. Lighter breeds tend to hatch toward the 28-30 day mark, and larger breeds around 32-34 days.

If you’re not sure what to expect from your momma goose who’s sitting on a nest of eggs, my suggestion is to give them a full 35 days before determining that the eggs were not fertile/viable.

We have American Buff Geese (a mid-weight breed) and hatching has always occurred right around 30 days.

When do you start counting?

Egg incubation starts when: a) you’ve gathered all the eggs and put them in an electric incubator, or b) momma goose has committed to sitting on them in her nest.

So when counting incubation days, start counting from the day the goose starts sitting on her nest full-time (NOT from the day the first egg is laid) or from the first day you put them in your incubator. 

Usually a goose will start sitting full-time (aka “going broody”) when she has anywhere from 8-12 eggs in her nest. I find this really depends on the individual goose. For instance, I have one goose who will go broody with as little as 6 eggs, and another that will amass at least 10 eggs before she goes broody.

Will a mother goose leave her nest? What care should be provided?

The frequency that a broody goose will leave her nest will largely depend on the temperament of the goose, as well as where she is in the brooding timeline.

For instance, a goose will go on “lock down” during the last three to five days of the incubation period, never leaving her nest at this point, even to go in search of food or water.

Leave a container of water and a small bowl of food within easy reach of her nest. She should be able to reach it without getting up. Actually, I recommend doing this from Day 1 of sitting, but it is most important during those last five days.

Prior to this “lock-down” period, a goose will leave her nest 1-2 times a day for up to 30 minutes at a time to bathe, eat, and drink. She will cover the nest, and sometimes her partner will watch over it while she takes a break, although this doesn’t always happen.

What if my goose isn’t leaving her nest?

Some momma geese are especially “in the zone” and won’t budge from their nests from the minute they decide to get down to the business of incubating. Even with food and water right under her bill, she may not eat or drink…

If your goose is in an especially deep “broody trance” (i.e. she won’t hiss or snake-neck you when you approach her nest), you may be able to gently pick her up and manually place her out of sight from the nesting area near a large tub of water and a little food to encourage bathing, drinking, and eating. Placing her within sight of her mate or the flock can also help to snap her out of it.

With a manual removal, she should return to her nest within 30 minutes. Often it only takes a few days of removing her to get the pattern in her head. She should then start getting up on her own, and save the “power sitting” for the last handful of days before babies start pipping.

How to hatch goose eggs WITHOUT an incubator

Good news! This part is easy. Aside for caring for momma goose as described in the above section, you do absolutely nothing.

Geese are excellent parents, and excellent brooders. Trust the process. Your goose will even take care of turning the eggs and keeping them at the perfect temperature and humidity.

How long will it take goslings to hatch after “pipping” starts?

In case you’ve never heard the term before, “pipping” is the point in late-stage incubation where the baby bird (in this case, goslings) uses the egg tooth on the tip of its bill to begin breaking through the internal membrane and shell. 

Goslings should fully emerge from the egg 24 hours after the first pip, but this process can take up to 48 hours. Be patient and avoid the temptation to “help,” which will likely end up harming or killing the gosling instead. (See below.)

When do you help a gosling that’s having trouble emerging from its egg?

Has it been over 48 hours since the gosling pipped and momma goose is not assisting? If “yes,” read on. If “no”… don’t interfere!

Assisting in the removal of the shell is fatal to the gosling if it is done too soon. This is because the gosling needs time to absorb the yolk and the blood from the membrane. This absorption begins after the initial pip. Interrupting this process will cause the gosling to bleed to death.

IT IS RARE TO NEED TO ASSIST A HATCH. This is especially true if you have let your goose incubate her own eggs. Please proceed with caution.

When the gosling has finished resting, it will begin the process of breaking the shell, rotating within the egg as it makes its way around the shell. (This part of the process is called “zipping.”) The result of zipping should be a “lid” that will lift off the top of the shell when complete.

This part of the process also takes time. The goslings will rest periodically. Don’t fret.

If the gosling has begun rotating in the egg but hasn’t made progress for a while, or can’t push the lid away for some reason, you may assist in gently removing the shell. Then, carefully, lift the gosling’s head up so that it can emerge the rest of the way on its own.

If at any point in removing the shell you see blood where you have made the break, STOP IMMEDIATELY. You may try again in a few hours.

Again, I can’t stress enough how important it is to be patient and resist the urge to interfere. If a gosling needs help, the mother goose usually knows what to do. It is rare to need to intervene, so please only do so if you are confident that there is a problem.

The goslings have hatched, but momma goose is still sitting – what to do?

Sometimes momma goose will continue to brood even once the eggs are hatched; this can happen when there are non-viable eggs still in the nest.

You can break the “broody trance” by removing the eggs, but you first want to care for any hatched goslings. A broody goose will sometimes neglect any hatched goslings while she tries to hatch the remaining eggs.

If there aren’t other geese or ganders around to care for the goslings while momma goose sits on the nest, the goslings can be at risk of being expelled from the nest and getting too cold or – worse – suffocated or squished under the sitting goose (very rare, although I have once heard of this happening).

Gather the hatched goslings and place them in a safe, dry spot with a heat lamp, food, and water. Depending on how long your goose has been sitting, you may want to wait one or two days to make sure the eggs she is sitting on are in fact not going to hatch. Consider “candling” them in a dark room with a strong flashlight if you want to be certain whether the remaining eggs are duds or have goslings inside. 

Once you remove the remaining eggs, you can reintroduce the goslings. Stick around for a few minutes to make sure momma goose is taking them back, but it is usually an easy reunion with all goslings getting quickly tucked under momma goose’s wings.

Why hatch goose eggs naturally vs incubating?

The simplest reason to let your geese hatch their own eggs is that it’s easy. Provided that your goose and her nest are in a safe, secure location, you truly need to do very little.

By contrast, incubating goose eggs yourself requires constant monitoring of humidity and temperature which can be a real time suck, depending on how fancy your incubator is. You will also need to turn the eggs at regular intervals. 

Temperature needs to be kept at around 100°F (37.7°C) throughout incubation, before being dropped to around 98-99°F (36.6-37.2°C) during the “lockdown” phase (last 3 to 5 days).

Determining humidity levels is trickier because you will need to take into consideration your climate.

If you want to incubate and hatch goose eggs yourself, I highly recommend this article by Katie over at Bramblewood Farms. She outlines how to determine the correct humidity to use for incubating and hatching by observing the air cell size in the egg.

Or you can let your goose/geese take care of these considerations for you, which is what I do! After all, a momma goose manages temperature and humidity naturally and instinctively.

Where can you get goose eggs?

If you want to try incubating and hatching your own goose eggs, but you don’t have your own geese, I highly recommend looking for local farms/breeders via the The Flock Directory, created by Liz Palmer. If you want to have a good cry, you can read Liz’s blog post about why she started The Flock Directory… I guarantee you will never want to have live baby birds shipped to you ever again.

Etsy is also a decent place to find hatching eggs, and many large hatcheries (McMurray, Purely Poultry, Metzer, etc) sell hatching eggs in addition to live birds. If you must order from a hatchery, please order hatching eggs and not live goslings. If you’re absolutely determined to get mail order live goslings, pay extra for food, heat, and the fastest possible shipping, and know that there’s a good chance they will suffer or die on route.  

In summary…

1. Hatching goose eggs can be tricky if you do it yourself, but momma goose knows best and can make the process easy for you. Be patient and trust the natural process.

2. Your most important job? Keeping your broody goose fed, hydrated, and safe.

3. After hatching, geese are absolutely the best parents and goslings are easy and fun! 

Do you have any goose-hatching experiences you’d like to share? I’d love to hear them! Drop your stories or questions in the comments.

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Check out the video summary of this article via our How to hatch goose eggs Google Web Story!

Flap on over to MJ’s other goose articles:

• What to feed geese: all your questions answered
• Top 10 reasons to raise geese
• 7 reasons why you shouldn’t get geese
• Male or female geese – which should you get?
• Adult geese vs goslings: which should you get? 
• How to poach duck and goose eggs to perfection
• 10 things you should know before you get ducks
• How to introduce new geese to your flock
• How to use geese for weed management 

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