Successful breeding of geese requires not only high-quality conditions of detention, but also good nutrition. Given a sufficient amount of nutrients and amino acids in the diet, the bird gives a good weight gain and egg production. In winter, it is very important to feed your pets with healthy food, give vitamins and stimulate their appetite.
Types of feed for geese
Properly formulated poultry diet is the key to healthy offspring and high productivity of the entire livestock. Weight gain, fertility, egg production and other factors for successful poultry production depend on how balanced and energetically valuable the feed is.
For example, by the beginning of the breeding period, geese should gain weight and be well-fed.
There are several types of feed, then we will consider their advantages, disadvantages and features. None of the types is used in its pure form. They combine, alternate, and each owner himself adjusts the diet depending on the breed of geese, on the season, on the conditions of detention and on the task that he pursues.
Wet
The wet type of food, or the so-called “mash”, is especially popular with small farms and private breeders, as it makes it possible to save a little – it can be prepared partly from the leftovers from your own table.
It includes:
- root crops (potatoes, carrots, beets);
- fresh white cabbage;
- pumpkin;
- turnips, turnips;
- freshly cut grass;
- fish tripe (in a small amount);
- slaughterhouse waste;
- boiled blood;
- milk serum.
It is very important to monitor the consistency of wet food. The ingredients should not stick together into a lump, this can adversely affect the digestion of the bird. Checking the density is easy: collect a little food in a handful, squeeze your palm, and then abruptly release it to the ground. If the pile turned out to be crumbly, then everything is in order, and the food is suitable for consumption.
Important! The wheat that was harvested the day before can be included in the composition of the mash by no more than 20%, otherwise the feed risks turning into gluten.
Do not leave wet food in the feeders for long periods of time, especially in hot weather. It may sour or become moldy. After the geese have eaten, it is best to clean the containers immediately.
Feeding mash means three meals a day. At the same time, the first meal is in the morning, no later than 7 o’clock in the morning, and the second – in the afternoon, so that the wet food has time to digest a little in advance.
dry
Dry or roughage is also very beneficial for the bird’s body, especially in winter. They include various grain crops – both crushed and whole.
Dry food ingredients:
- wheat;
- crushed corn;
- barley grain;
- rye waste;
- chopped oats;
- millet.
The amount of harmful impurities should not be high.
An example rule is:
- cockle – 0,25%;
- tares – 0,1%;
- spores – 0,05%.
Important! Roughage is easier to digest if a little wet food is mixed into it.
Geese eat dry food better if it is flavored with a concentrate with the addition of beets, potatoes or pumpkin. Beets can be taken as fodder and sugar. Also, birds are given clover flour, the daily rate can reach 300 g per day.
Combined
Special compound feed can be purchased at an agricultural store, it varies in age and composition. In order for the bird not to choose only large parts of the feed and eat fully, responsible manufacturers began to produce their products in granules.
The compound feed contains artificial growth stimulants, preservatives and hormones.
Compound feed is necessary for goslings in the early stages of feeding, and it can also be an excellent help in winter if there are difficulties with preparing dry food.
Basic rules for feeding geese in winter
There are some features of the winter nutrition of geese:
- an abundance of protein foods (it is necessary to give more grain, oats, chaff);
- morning feedings are lighter, in the evening they give coarse food;
- vitamin supplements (both natural and industrial production).
How to feed geese in winter at home
In winter, birds do not have the opportunity to independently obtain food on pastures and reservoirs in order to diversify their diet. This makes some adjustments to the winter diet. In the cold season, three meals a day: in the morning, afternoon and evening. The time must be clearly defined in order to develop a food reflex in the bird.
Hay
They have been harvesting hay since the summer: each forage crop is mowed at the right time, dried in the sun and then dried in a shaded, well-ventilated place. Hay is then stacked in stacks or stacks on special sites.
More advanced technology is hay pressing, but this method is not possible in small households, as it requires special equipment.
Hay is given to geese dry or steamed, the main condition is to grind it thoroughly. For this product to be especially useful, it must be composed of different cereals. Dry nettle does not lose its useful qualities when dried, so it can be harvested and given to birds in winter.
green flour
Grass flour is prepared by artificially removing moisture from perennial and meadow grasses. Raw materials are preliminarily dried in the sun, leaving them on the field after mowing. Then they are collected and crushed as carefully as possible with special mills and dried in dryers. The moisture content of the finished product should not exceed 12%.
Did you know? There is a practice in American cotton fields to call geese to weed the beds. Geese do not eat cotton, but they effectively fight weeds.
Before sending the finished flour for storage in bags, it is kept in a container for a day. Flour is stored in a dark room where there is no access to moisture. This product is rich in carotene, protein, vitamins and minerals.
Silage
An extremely valuable winter product, as it retains its useful nutritional qualities during long-term storage. Geese receive vitamins, amino acids, beta-carotene and successfully gain weight. Green corn, beets, cabbage, carrot tops, legume-cereal mixtures are the most optimal for ensiling.
Silage is forage crops harvested without access to air, fermented in its own juice. If there are many sugar-containing crops in the silage, then fermentation can occur. Silage is harvested at the rate of 35 kg per adult goose.
It is considered of high quality if it has a light brown color and a slight sour smell.
Basic harvesting rules:
- observance of the optimal mowing phase for each type of plant;
- preliminary drying (increases the concentration of sugar);
- thorough grinding (lactic acid bacteria multiply well in the released plant juice);
- the moisture content of the mass is not more than 70% (moisture can be removed with straw, and added by introducing pumpkin or water);
- good sealing (to displace air as much as possible);
- storage in sealed trenches or pits (without access to oxygen and water).
To store silage, you can make a hole: dig the earth to a depth of two meters with an expansion upwards, cover the walls with clay. The width and length of the pit is at the discretion of the owner. The bottom is covered with straw or dry leaves. Then there, in layers of 25 cm, compacting, ground greens are laid.
Then the tightly packed hole is covered with a film and pressed down with bales of straw (you can sprinkle it with earth). To protect against the wind, a canopy is arranged over the pit, and grooves are pulled out to restrict access to moisture. Feed from the silo pit is taken at a time – in the open air it quickly loses its useful properties.
seed
Weed seeds, as well as seeds and fruits of some trees (horse chestnut, acorn) are easy to prepare for the winter, providing your goose herd with additional food. Quinoa, nettle, burdock, manna, chicken millet, horse sorrel, beech, linden, ash, oak, acacia, birch catkins are used.
The seeds are dried, and the fruits are soaked in water for several days to remove the bitter taste.
Deciduous tree brooms
The leaves contain useful carotene, so they also need to be harvested for future use. In temperate zones, they are best harvested in June, as the concentration of vitamin A is maximum during this period. Leaves useful for birds include maple, aspen, birch, poplar, willow, acacia and elderberry leaves.
For the convenience of harvesting and storage, the collected material is tied with small brooms and dried in the open air, but in the shade. In winter, these brooms can be ground into flour and added to the mash, or you can simply hang it in the house and let the bird peck this vitamin “supplement” on its own.
aquatic plants
Duckweed, elodea, salvinia contain many useful minerals, vitamins and trace elements, including iodine, magnesium, cobalt and copper. This product can be mixed into wet food, or it can be given as a separate food.
Did you know? If a goose is not given water for two days, its egg production completely disappears. Recovery can be very difficult and take a long time.
Harvesting of aquatic plants occurs in the same way as the forages already mentioned above: some are ensiled, hay is prepared from sedge and reed, and cattail and manna, for example, are used for grass meal.
Vitamin Complexes
Coniferous trees (spruce, pine) will help to compensate for the lack of vitamin C. Also, the use of needles has a positive effect on the gastrointestinal tract, increases egg production and the nutritional value of eggs. Goslings develop more actively and acquire good immunity.
To prepare such a useful supplement, it is enough to dry the coniferous branches and grind them together with the needles using a meat grinder.
Amino acids are very important for geese, so in winter it is useful for them to give meal and cake. Make sure that the cake is fresh, not musty and does not have a bitter aftertaste. Shrot (waste oil production) geese love more.
Grain is the main source of nutrients in the cold season. Oats are rich in fiber, germinated barley makes up for the lack of vitamin B.
Carrots in dried and salted form are a source of useful vitamins, it is necessary to include them in the diet of birds. Cabbage can also be salted for the winter. It is rich in amino acids, and one goose can eat up to 200 g per day.
At the beginning of autumn, mountain ash and hawthorn are harvested, which will also make up for the lack of vitamins in the bird’s body in winter. It is best to store the collected bunches in a barn or in the attic, you just need to make sure that it is dry there.
How to make a diet
When developing a diet for geese, one should take into account not only the season, but also the needs of the age, as well as the breed of the bird. It is very important to pay attention to compound feeds, since their composition is balanced and already contains useful mineral and vitamin supplements.
For little goslings
The diet for young animals is based on their breed and age, as well as taking into account the tasks of the farm.
Important! Remember that an egg for a gosling up to 10 days old must be hard-boiled and peeled.
For the first ten weeks of life, a highly nutritious diet is needed to promote growth and development.
In the first three days of life, goslings are fed with refined corn grain mixed with a small amount of grass meal and powdered milk.
You can add some crushed peas to this mixture. Already on the fourth day, you can switch to a full-fledged compound feed with the appropriate marking by age. This includes mash from finely ground grain with the inclusion of a boiled egg.
Upon reaching 10 days, goslings begin to receive:
- protein supplements, i.e. meat and bone, fish meal or fodder yeast;
- fresh herbs;
- mineral feed.
If the task is to grow a meat goose, then feeding is carried out more intensively, up to 8 times a day in the first week, and then 3-4 times in the future. In order to use compound feed economically, it is best to purchase it in granules. The size of the granules for goslings up to 20 days old is 2-3 mm, over 20 days – 5-8 mm.
Animal foods are not the best source of protein, but until recently their use was unavoidable. Modern synthetic preparations make it possible to reduce or even completely stop the supply of such feeds, replacing them with balanced feed.
Also, do not forget that goslings get used to their diet, and they need time to get used to a new diet. Take your time and get used to it gradually.
For adults
With the onset of cold weather, the number of meals increases to 3-4 times a day. The first two meals consist of wet mash with the addition of potatoes, flour and feed. The remaining feedings include roughage: barley, wheat or oat grain.
It is best if it is germinated. You can also add silage rich in carbohydrates and acids.
Approximate daily norms for one individual are:
- 0,5 kg of potatoes or beets (sugar);
- 0,15 kg of hay dust;
- 0,07 kg of grain;
- 0,1 kg carrots;
- 0,025 kg of mineral additives.
It often happens that with the advent of winter, geese lose their appetite. To increase it, use yeast. About 20 g of yeast dissolved in warm water (2 l) is taken per kilogram of ground grains or flour. This mixture is infused at room temperature for some time. This is how lactic acid is formed, which is useful for geese. Then this solution is poured over the food.
The basic scheme for feeding an adult goose in winter:
- morning meal (6-7 am) consists of germinated grain and herbal flour in a ratio of 1:1.
- Daily meal (2-3 hours of the day) – a mash of beets, potatoes, hay dust or seeds, mineral supplements.
- Evening meal (8 p.m.) consists of a third of the daily norm of grain and grass meal (or ground leaves).
This scheme can be supplemented, rearrangements and changes are allowed depending on the capabilities of this particular farm and the feed that is available. Mineral feeds include, for example, gravel, it is given once every 7 days in the amount of 1 kg per 100 heads.
Also, do not forget to include silage in the diet, if it is harvested. The consumption rate is 100-150 g per day per bird.
An adult goose drinks up to two liters of fluid per day. Drinkers can be made from old buckets or troughs, the main thing is to change the water regularly. If there is a lot of snow, it is useful to water the geese with melt water. A lack of water can adversely affect the egg production of a bird, so watering must be carefully monitored.
What not to feed geese in winter
When compiling and adjusting the diet of a bird, it is necessary to monitor the behavior of pets and their development. This will help to understand what the geese need at the moment, and take timely measures so that by the time the geese are brought to the tribe, they have time to gain enough mass.
There are also general recommendations on what not to do:
- no need to try to make up for summer days on the pasture with an excess of green fodder and water, this can lead to intestinal disorders in young individuals;
- do not get carried away with dry flour, otherwise the birds have difficulty breathing and even cough. If this still happened, start cleaning the esophagus – solder with water, increase the moisture content of the feed;
- in no case should sprouted potatoes be given to geese, for them it is a poisonous product;
- do not give water from under the potato, it can provoke severe gastrointestinal upset.
helpful hints
Summing up, we highlight the most important points:
- Harvest food for the future, do not worry that it will remain and the work will be wasted.
- Harvesting of hay and silage must be done on time, each plant has its own favorable period.
- Make the drinker flowable, it will save you time, not to mention the fact that it is more beneficial for the bird than ordinary drinkers.
- Do not neglect vitamins and mineral supplements in the winter, this will affect the egg production and fatness of the geese.
- Do not be afraid to give roughage, the goose gastrointestinal tract copes well with it.
Keeping poultry is a very laborious task, but geese are distinguished by their endurance and unpretentiousness, so you can safely feed them with grain and various dry herbs and leaves, knowing that your labors will be beneficial. Of course, you will have to try to harvest raw materials, but the result is worth it.
