Geese too dumb to use pond as a refuge?

[oldryder]

I live in rural MN on 35 acres including a pond approx 2 acres. Property is adjacent to a creek/slough that seems to be a freeway for predatory wildlife including coyotes, a bobcat, weasels, and various raptors.

In the past an owl killed a lot of chickens and yesterday I observed 2 bald eagles feasting on a goose carcass. Don't know if the eagles killed the goose. Usually when theres a kill all I find is a large area of feathers and no remains.

Have geese again after a couple of years without. Raised 11 goslings this spring and bought 6 adults as babysitters.

Everyone gets along fine and 2 of the adults are nesting. Geese do go by the pond but seem to overnite near the barn.

In the past the geese always seemed safe as long as the pond wasn't frozen as they were smart enough to overnite in/near the pond.

Now I've had 2 killed in the last week. I don't want to keep losing them but don't really know how to teach them to use the pond as a safe haven.

Suggestions are welcome.

 

[livininbrazil]

I live in rural MN on 35 acres including a pond approx 2 acres. Property is adjacent to a creek/slough that seems to be a freeway for predatory wildlife including coyotes, a bobcat, weasels, and various raptors.

In the past an owl killed a lot of chickens and yesterday I observed 2 bald eagles feasting on a goose carcass. Don't know if the eagles killed the goose. Usually when theres a kill all I find is a large area of feathers and no remains.

Have geese again after a couple of years without. Raised 11 goslings this spring and bought 6 adults as babysitters.

Everyone gets along fine and 2 of the adults are nesting. Geese do go by the pond but seem to overnite near the barn.

In the past the geese always seemed safe as long as the pond wasn't frozen as they were smart enough to overnite in/near the pond.

Now I've had 2 killed in the last week. I don't want to keep losing them but don't really know how to teach them to use the pond as a safe haven.

Suggestions are welcome.

Unfortunately, domestic geese are domestic, and like to be near the house a lot of the time. Sometimes mine will stay the night on the bank of the pond, but most of the time they´r up near the house. I don´t really have to worry about preds, but most people keep their geese locked up in pred-proof sheds at night.

 

[Miss Lydia]

The only way to protect your geese and not lose them to preds is to lock them in secure building at night. Another thing to consider is you may have snapping turtles they will prey on gosling from below large mouth bass too. The can also seriously injure an adult goose. So you may want to make sure you don't have snappers before your geese decide to venture onto the pond. I'd be very surprised with having a 2 acre pond you don't have a pretty large pop of snappers. Very sorry for your loss.

 

[RURU]

Just to back this up on snapping turtles. I have two small man made ponds and this past week found a baby snapping turtle in it. Now we are pretty far up from the river and still snapping turtles make it up this way and lay eggs and I have found several snapping turtle babies in our small pond. With you having two acre pond you will have snappers in there and yes they kill baby goslings and bass fish do eat baby goslings...

As far as not putting them up at night you will keep losing them to predators! As both Living and Miss Lydia said they need a place to be penned up at night and kept safe from predators. Domestic geese prefer to be close to your home and feel safe there. They do not get on water to sleep at night.

 

[8GeeseALaying]

I have a 1 acre pond, this spring i lost 3 goslings all of which were my babies that i bred. My only pied, a lavender, and my only tufted toulouse. With in one week of being some what dry, 6 snapping turtles averaging 30 lbs or more had crawled into it and began attacking the babies. I declared war on them and shot all turtles that were in there. We now do a "sweep" of the pond once a week to make sure there are no more. Here is one of the nasty things

These can bite goslings up to 2 mos old in half and behead an adult goose or remove a leg. They dont eat the whole thing they just get a bite and the leave the rest.
Another thing to watch for is snakes, a couple copperheads got in my pond this week and bit one of the tufted roman goslings, it also died. Those snakes no longer exist.
What im getting at is, while a pond is nice to have for waterfowl it should never be considered a safe haven for them no matter how well taken care of it is.