Farm News 07-17-05

Sunday morning, after chores

Geese Hold Watermelon Celebration

There are few things that geese like better than watermelon, and the watermelon season is finally here, again. Monday evening I took out the first slice of melon (after having eaten the heart) to the geese. Curious, as usual, they came running up to see what I was going to do. When still about twenty feet away, Beth recognized what it was and let out the most godawful screech I have ever heard a goose produce and covered the remaining distance in about three steps. When the others caught up, there was nothing but a nice loud murmur of happy goose sounds.

Most domestic geese tend to be loud. African and Chinese geese, the ones with the knobs at the base of their beaks, are the loudest. They have a call that sounds a lot like a steam whistle. Chinese are generally considered the best 'weeder' and guard geese, although I've never found them good for much of anything except amusement or holiday meals.

Doorbell was a Chinese gander with a tremendous voice who occupied my yard for a year. Like most good domestic animals, he liked dog biscuits, and had learned to poke around in my pocket where I commonly carried them to find the broken pieces. Whenever a car came into the driveway, or an airplane or hawk flew overhead, or too many leaves fluttered on a tree, Doorbell would sound the alarm, a sound similar to that produced by a calliope with only three functioning pipes, all out of tune with anything else in the world.

Doorbell knew his business, which was to attack anything different. He would not allow people to exit from their vehicle; he would peck on the doors of the cars, honk, flap his wings, and generally raise hell until the car left or I came to the rescue. Once I left a box sitting in the yard and went into the house. When I came back Doorbell was dealing with that box, with his wings and neck extended full out, he would step in, peck hard, and hop back.

The reason Doorbell didn't last long was that I was the only person he tolerated. I was his friend, everybody else was his enemy, with one exception, the male Collie. Doorbell was more interested in tactical maneuvers than diplomacy. Basically, he had four modes: Sleep, Eat, Patrol, and Attack. I was his boss, the Collie was a helpful self-propelled intruder alarm, and everything else that moved was the enemy.

Toulouse geese, the big gray geese, are not nearly as noisy or obnoxious, generally. Two Toulouse ganders live here: Butch, a fine looking gander; and Sarge, who isn't so fine looking but was raised by humans, knows his name and generally comes when called. There doesn't seem to be any dominance competition between them, although they will engage in occasional battles during breeding season.

If I had the choice to make again, I think I might have chosen Pilgrim geese. They are a slightly smaller goose, less inclined to hysterics, and can be sexed by standing back and looking at them. The ganders are white and the females are gray with a white band across their breasts.

There are four reasons I like to keep geese and their names are Beth, Sarge, Bebe, and Butch, the four geese who live here. Domestic geese often live twenty to thirty years. They do not like change, ever, for any reason, at any time, in any way, whatever. Introducing change into a gaggle is about as easy as controlling the clothing choices of fourteen year olds. Nature itself is providing all of the challenges that can be handled. Once you decide to keep geese you cannot count on attrition to get you out of the bargain.

Geeks could delight in the mesh security network that exists on this place. A mesh network is a wireless network, with lots of redundancy (magic word), that passes data around. The ganders are an important node in the mesh. Their alarm calls are recognized not only by the dogs, the guardians, but also by the other poultry, mostly prey.

Two ganders means that one of them is alert most of the time, but you can't count on them to always be alert. Two dogs means that there is more alert time each day, but it still doesn't add up to twenty four hours. Two dogs plus two ganders, however, add up to a lot of time during which something will raise a ruckus if anything changes suddenly. Both the dogs and geese listen to the sounds of the wild animals and sound the alarm if they hear a mouse being killed in the pasture. They also listen to each other for alarms.

From February through April geese can be very defensive and quite obnoxious, especially if they have goslings. The goslings are delightful but, if there are very many of them, become quite rowdy before they attain maturity. A year ago a gang of young geese destroyed, uprooted, and scattered a nice big clump of Gayfeather (Liatris). They look and act like a movie teen hoodlum gang.

Geese need to be fenced into a pasture with goats or a donkey. Geese eat grass and goats eat brush; between them they can clean up a brushy area quite nicely. The fencing that will hold geese and goats is also sufficient to protect them from wandering predators. When planning your fencing, remember that keeping the predators out is a major function of fences.

I hope we can keep the four geese we now have for the rest of their lives. After I have lived with them for ten years I might wish to redefine the relationship, but, for now, at the four year point, I'm happy with them, even though they are mostly a nuisance.

Ayte Does It, Again

Thursday morning Ayte had a nest box full of fur with something wiggling under it. I haven't counted them, yet, but I hope she has fewer than the twelve she had last time. Ayte is a good mother but raising twelve bunnies taxed her. She will have these bunnies with her for six weeks, then the bunnies will go to a rearing cage. A day or two after the bunnies are weaned she will visit the buck for breeding. About four weeks and four days after breeding she will have bunnies, again.

Thanksgiving Disappears, Reappears

Early this week Thanksgiving, the Blue Slate turkey hen, failed to appear for evening feeding. I looked for her but couldn't find either her or a pile of blue feathers. She didn't appear the next morning, nor that evening. By the next morning, I had given up hope. Then, at evening chores, I heard the chirping of a hen turkey. Sure enough, there she was, raiding the chicken house feeder.

Somewhere, she has established a new nest and is now incubating the eggs. If she has a good location, then we might expect baby turkeys in four weeks and a few days. This clutch will be the last of those sired by Christmas, posthumous progeny. Female birds have various interesting methods for storing semen, enabling a recently deceased to still be the sire of fertile eggs.


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