I am by no means skilled at incubating eggs, but I’ve had pretty decent results with chicken, turkey and guinea eggs. Using a styrofoam incubator with fan and automatic egg turned that we bought years ago at Tractor Supply, I’ve been able to get a 75% and more hatch rate with these birds.
Goose eggs? Not even close. It’s not just a matter of placing the eggs in the automatic egg turner and making sure the temperature and humidity remain stable. The eggs are simply WAY too large to fit in the turner, meaning the necessity of hand turning. Even with keeping water in the reservoirs and hand turning twice a day, I’ve had maybe 10% hatch, if that high. I’ve tried Cotton Patch, American Buff and Dewlap Toulouse as well as our own mixed breed flock’s eggs with little luck.
Let’s face it; hatching eggs are cheaper than goslings. A dozen hatching eggs can run around the same price of two or three goslings, so there is a strong financial motivation there. We have a mixed breed flock of geese (with an Embden gander as well as a Chinese gander & females that we’ve been told are African crosses) that I would like to transition to Sebastopol and American Buff. So, I decided to practice with the plentiful eggs our flock is currently providing.
A friend who has quite a bit of success hatching goose eggs suggested that, when I turn the eggs twice a day, I mist them down with a spray bottle of water before closing the incubator. My last attempt at the end of egg laying season last year was a group of eight eggs. Following the friend’s advice, I got five goslings! WOOHOO!!!
This year I’m trying a round plastic incubator that holds 8 eggs and turns the eggs using a slowly rotating rack. Keeping fingers crossed, because our Sebastopols are up and running with egg laying, and I wouldn’t mind a few more of these lovely birds!