Geese can be difficult to incubate and hatch compared to chickens and ducks. Ideally the incubating is left to a hen, duck, goose, or other broody bird, but luck doesn’t always provide a broody when you need one. Goslings make up for their difficult hatching by being incredibly easy to raise.
Goose Egg Collection and Storage
Goose eggs should be collected daily for incubating in an incubator. Use a pencil to label the eggs with the date and mark one side with an X and the other with an O. You can collect eggs and store them at room temperature for up to 10 days. If you need to collect eggs for a longer period of time the eggs are best stored in a fridge until you need to hatch them. You will have poorer hatching rates from refrigerated eggs, but better than if they were stored at room temperature for a longer period of time.
Eggs should be turned a minimum of 3 times daily before you set them in an incubator or under a broody. Simply turn the eggs so either the X or O is showing, whichever was previously facing down. Goose eggs should be stored laying flat and not upright in a carton.
When you’re ready to start incubating the eggs you can place them under a broody or into your incubator. The eggs need to kept on their sides during incubation and should never be placed upright in an incubator.
I use this (relatively) cheap and easy to clean incubator for hatching. My preferred incubator for the actual incubation process is a trusty old Brinsea Octagon 20, which can fit up to 9 goose eggs.
Temperature for Incubating Goose Eggs
Goose eggs need to be incubated at 99.5F for the duration of incubating with a forced air incubator or 100.5F for a still air incubator. After lock down you should lower the temp to 98-99F to increase the oxygen levels for the goslings. Once they have internally pipped they will start using their lungs to breath air.
Humidity
The humidity levels you need will vary greatly depending on your local and household climate.
The scientific, laboratory-condition answer is about 55% for incubation and about 75% for hatching. Our homes are not laboratories and you can expect your humidity to be different. Most experienced hatchers find it’s often way too high! Use the scientific answer for a starting point only!
For my own hatching in a humid climate, I need to run the incubator around 30% humidity for the first 26 days and then increase to about 60% for hatching.
So how do you know what to keep your humidity at?
It’s best to track air cell size by tracing the outline of the air cell at your weekly candling OR you can weigh the egg(s) weekly to make sure they’re losing weight properly. You’ll be looking for an overall weight loss of 16%.
Based on that information you can:
- Increase humidity if the air cells/weight are showing that you’re losing moisture too fast.
- Decrease humidity if the air cells/weight are showing that you’re losing moisture too slow.
I use this temperature and humidity gauge (affiliate link).
Learn how to tell the gender of your geese with this handy post.
Cooling and Misting
Starting at day 8, waterfowl eggs benefit from a daily cooling and misting. Take the eggs out of the incubator, mist lightly with cool water, and then allow the eggs to cool for 10 minutes. Place back in the warm incubator after the 10 minutes has elapsed. On days 15 – 21, eggs should be cooled for 15 minutes. From days 22-25, the eggs should be cooled for 20 minutes.
The cooling and misting process mimics when the mother goose gets off the nest and returns wet from a swim.
Incubation Period
Geese need to incubate for anywhere between 28 to 35 days. I know, that’s quite a range! Almost all of my goslings end up hatching on day 32, but sometimes I have some hatch earlier or later.
You’ll need to place your eggs into lock down on day 26. This is where you increase humidity and stop messing with the eggs until they’ve hatched. At this point opening the incubator can cause dangerous humidity drops that can result in your babies being shrink-wrapped (membrane dries on them and they can’t move to hatch). Moving the eggs during this time can result in the goslings failing to get in the proper position to hatch. Basically just don’t touch the eggs!
Hatching
Yay! You hear little peeps coming from the incubator and notice one or more of the eggs have a tiny crack (external pip) in the shell. You might be tempted to open the incubator at this point and pick at the eggs to “help” them hatch. Don’t!
Once goslings have made an external pip they rest and absorb the yolk into their abdomen. During this time the blood-filled membrane surrounding them starts shunting the blood back into the gosling. Picking at the shell to “help” during this time can be fatal to your gosling! Tearing that membrane, even by accident, will result in blood less that can easily kill your gosling. “Helping” the gosling to hatch too soon (after it’s blood supply has reabsorbed) can result in it coming out of the egg before absorbing all of it’s yolk sac – which, you guessed it, will kill it. Don’t touch the eggs!
Once the gosling has reabsorbed the blood from the membrane and the yolk into its abdomen it’s ready to hatch. It will start zipping next, which is where it starts chipping the egg in a roughly horizontal line across the circumference of the egg. They usually take lots of breaks during this time so don’t panic if they stop for a bit.
After the gosling zips the egg it will push the shell apart and hatch. It will be wet, wobbly, and sort of weak. Just leave it alone to dry and rest in the warm incubator. Usually, by 24 hours old hatchlings are completely fluffed up and moving around easily. At this point, you should move them to a brooder if all of the eggs have hatched. If you still have eggs in the process of hatching, go ahead and leave everyone in the incubator for a little longer. The absorbed yolk sac will feed the goslings for up to 3 days.
Once your goslings have hatched you can check out my guide to raising geese to learn how to care for them!
I have read and used few articles about incubating & hatching geese, BUT THIS IS THE ONLY one you should take as a complete quide – works perfectly and I am happy to I found this one. Thank you very much for sharing this knowledge. Thank you xxx
Thank you for the kind words and I’m glad that you found my guide useful!
My gosling has been zipping for 72hrs. Still not completed. I am worried. What do I do?
As hard as it is, you don’t do anything except make sure the humidity is where it needs to be for hatching. Other than that, if they aren’t able to hatch on their own there’s usually an underlying health issue and it’s best to let them be.
Our goose has already started laying, early for Michigan. I have collected 15 today and they are dirty. Should I wipe them off with a dry towel or wet one before sticking them in an incubator?
You can wipe them off gently with a dry towel. Anything wet risks washing off the bloom that helps prevent bacteria from getting into the egg.
By far the most informative guide on hatching goose eggs I could find! Thank you for taking the time to write this up.
No problem!
What is the best incubator for incubating goose eggs
The very best option is a broody bird – goose, duck, muscovy, or even a chicken. However, I use a Brinsea incubator (a discontinued Octagon 20) which can hold 9 goose eggs. Brinsea is a very good brand and has a number of different incubators for different budgets and needs. I also have a much cheaper Janoel 12 that I like to use for hatching because it’s easier to take apart and disinfect.
I am using an incubator from my school to hatch the chicken eggs that were started before schools were closed. I was planning to use it to try to hatch geese eggs. It has a self turner. Is that ok to use or would it be better to take that out and hand turn?
It’s going to depend on the type of self-turner and how strong it is. If it’s the type that cups the eggs and holds them upright then you’ll need to remove it. If it allows eggs to lay flat you can try it, but check to make sure it’s strong enough to actually turn the goose eggs.
Am I correct in assuming that during the first 8 days, you simply rotate the eggs but don’t mist them at all?
Yes, that’s correct!
I have been self turning the eggs about 3 times a day now. I’ve read everywhere all different things to hatch. My temp is 99.5 and 50-55% it says for goose eggs. Now reading your info I’m confused on what to do.
The right humidity for each hatch can vary widely. It requires some trial and error, which can be a bit stressful when you have lives depending on it. The best thing you can do is to either track the size of the air cells or the weight of the eggs weekly to make sure they’re losing moisture at a reasonable rate. Too fast means you need more humidity; too slow means you need less humidity.
In my climate, the humidity tends to be naturally higher and I have to run my incubators at lower humidity or risk drowning whatever I’m hatching. People in drier climates likely need to run their incubators with more humidity.
so just to confirm on this if the air cell is getting to big too fast you need more humidity and if your air cell is small and not getting larger at a reasonable rate you would lower your humidity?
Yep! That’s correct!
In my last hatch the first four goslings were all over the incubator moving and bumping the remaining eggs. After a day I was concerned and removed the fluff babies to my bathroom with a heat lamp. None of the other eggs hatched. Even those that had begun to pip I am about to start another group of eggs and would like better results. Should I have left them in even though the unhatched eggs were being stepped on and moved around?
It won’t hurt the other eggs to be moved around by the first hatchers. It’s usually okay to move them out after 24 hours though. The main thing to watch if you move them out is the humidity. If it drops too low the goslings still hatching can become shrinkwrapped. You can cover yourself and the incubator with a towel while you remove the goslings and then mist the remaining eggs with water – be sure to work quickly.
Did you open up eggs that didn’t hatch to try and figure out what the issue was? That can be a good learning experience to better understand why a hatch went poorly.
It is day 26 for our goose egg. What should the temperature and humidity be? We are first timers and are feeling a little anxious.
The temperature for incubation needs to be right around 99.5F. For hatching, I recommend dropping it down to 98-99F to increase oxygen levels. However, you can keep it at 99.5F and still have excellent hatches.
There isn’t a definite, 100% correct answer for humidity. The scientific answer would be about 55% for incubation and 75% for hatching. For my humid climate, that’s way too high and I have much better results with lower humidity. The best thing you can do (it’s a little late for your current hatch) is to either track the air cell or the weight weekly to make sure they’re losing the right amount of moisture. Adjust humidity up if they’re losing too much moisture or down if they’re not losing enough.
Wonderful and helpful guide. Once the goslings have hatched, how long should they stay in the incubator? Do I need to move them under a heat lamp and for how long? Also, what would you suggest feeding them for the first few weeks?
I like to leave them in the incubator for about 24 hours. That’s enough time for their down to fluff up and to be steady on their feet.
They will need heat for up to 6 weeks but often can spend their days without as early as 3 weeks (if it’s not too cool outside). Ideally, you’ll want to feed them a waterfowl starter and lots of fresh grass and weeds daily. The fresh greens are very important to help them thrive. If you want to read more about caring for goslings I have a post here: https://bramblewoodhill.com/beginners-guide-raising-geese/
Hi Katie,
We just had a mother goose successfully hatch 5 goslings on Saturday. She seem to have less energy yesterday and was sitting most of time. The father has been great at coparenting, very gentle. Just a moment ago, I came out to check geese and found the mother dead. Is it because she basically focused on eggs and starved herself!? I’m totally shocked. And am not able to find a lot of info about this online… Any advice or thoughts would be great.
Thanks,
Alice
I’m so sorry to hear that you lost mother goose! It’s certainly a possibility that she wasn’t getting off the nest to care for herself and starved. I’ve heard of it happening with broody chickens but I would expect geese to be a bit smarter than chickens. Another possibility is that she ate something poisonous which could better explain a rapid decline in health.
For the goslings, I would set up a large area with a heat source for them and that the gander can either live in or get into to visit. Once they’re old enough to be off of heat they can spend all their time with him.
Hello Katie,
Thank you for sharing your expertise with the rest of us. I am writing because we recently found three goose eggs in shallow water along a river where a colony of white, brown, and Canada geese lives. We placed the eggs on dry land but, after coming back the next day, the geese do not seem to be paying them much attention. Is there a way to assess whether the eggs may yet be viable, and whether, being inexperienced and lacking proper equipment, we should collect them and attempt to incubate them at home? I understand from your post that there are delicate questions of timing in even the best of circumstances. I do not know how long the eggs were in the water, but the weather over the last couple of days has been reasonably warm.
Thank you, S
Unfortunately, if the eggs were submerged in water, even partially, there’s a good chance they aren’t viable. I would recommend leaving the eggs be. However, if you really want to try your hand at incubating them you could give it a shot. Make sure to candle the eggs at 1 week if you do and dispose of any that don’t show any development.
I have an egg that I’m almost positive is a goose that was accidentally brought to my house in a shipment of mulch. I built an incubator, I incubated it, and it survived and has been doing well! I believe I’m at day 19 or 20. (I don’t know how old it was when I found it but based on when I candled it, it looks like I should be at or around day 20) I’ve done some research but I’m still nervous for what I’m going to do during the hatching process and when it hatches. Do you have any tips on what to do when it’s hatching, what to feed it, what’s a good bedding for the brooder, how I should give it water, really just any tips you may have for a first timer who wasn’t even planning on this would really help! 🙂 Thank you!
That’s pretty cool!
So when you incubate you start counting from when you put it in the incubator (or under a broody). If you put the egg in the incubator 20 days ago then it’s on day 20. Assuming it’s a goose egg you’ll want to prepare for hatching when you get to day 26. You’ll increase humidity, stop turning the egg, and not open the incubator.
During hatching, you need to leave it alone to do its thing. Trying to help it hatch can result in killing the gosling if it’s not ready. if it’s not able to hatch on its own and the humidity is fine then there is likely a problem with the gosling and sadly it wasn’t meant to live.
For bedding waterfowl, I really like pelleted bedding. I find it too dusty in a chick brooder, but with goslings and ducklings it’s the best. It’s very absorbent and easy to scoop it when it gets really wet. I have a guide to raising goslings here that you can take a look at: https://bramblewoodhill.com/beginners-guide-raising-geese/
My daughter found an abandoned egg by our pond last Wednesday. It had a tiny crack from being dropped. We brought it home and made a homemade incubator to try and give this precious baby its best chance of survival. It’s forming beautifully. This is exactly what I needed!! Thank you so much.
This might be a silly question but do I need to make a separate Hatcher or can decrease the temp when it comes time for it to hatch and increase the humidity in the same incubator we made that it’s being incubating in?
You’re very welcome! No, you don’t need to have a separate incubator to hatch in. You can hatch in the same incubator.
can u set this to be printable . or e mail me it .
Not a problem! I just added a form near the bottom of the post that you can sign up on to get a printable reference guide.
Katie, We have eggs that our two geese have laid over the past month. Should we try to incubate them, or just ones we think are newer, and eat the others?
I would try the newest ones (they’ll likely be the cleanest). You can also candle the eggs to see the size of the air cells: big air cell = older, little air cell = newer. The older eggs might be getting close to not being edible though.
Ok, thank you. If I test them (for edibility) will the bad ones float and good ones sink, like chicken eggs?
Hi again, Katie, Since I’m having trouble seeing the air cell on the dirty ones, could I test them by putting them in water to see if they float or sink? And then incubate the ones that sink? Thanks.