Four Embdens, first year with them. On any warm afternoon they stand about with their bills open breathing fast, wings held a little out from the body. They have shade and a trough but no pool.
Coming from chickens this looks alarming to me, although they are eating and carrying on as normal. Is panting just how geese handle heat, and is the lack of a pool something I should fix before next summer?
Normal, and the wings held out is part of the same system. They do not sweat, so an open bill and a bit of air under the wings is most of what they have.
Fix the pool, though, and not only for heat. Geese dunk their heads to cool off and to keep their nostrils clean, so they want water deep enough to get the whole head under rather than a trough they can only drink from. A cheap paddling pool in the shade is the single best thing you can put in a goose run.
Shade or water first, if I can only sort one of them properly before next year?
Deep shade, then water, and put the water in the shade so the two are the same job. A pool in full sun gets warm by noon and they will stand next to it rather than in it.
Mine pant for ten minutes after any excitement. Postman counts as excitement.
The one that is not about weather: an open bill when it is neither hot nor just after exertion. Especially with wheezing, gurgling or a rattle, discharge from the nostrils or eyes, a swollen face, tail bobbing on each breath, or a bird standing apart from the others and off its feed.
Waterfowl pick up respiratory infections, including fungal ones that trace back to mouldy bedding or feed. So keep the bedding dry, bin anything damp, store feed properly and get air moving through the shelter.
@shade_before_water · 4w ago
The difference between warm geese and geese in trouble is whether they settle. After a chase or a round of honking at something, panting for a few minutes and then stopping is nothing.
What I act on is a goose panting hard that cannot settle even in the shade, going wobbly or weak, not getting up, or not drinking. That is heat stress rather than cooling off, and it does not wait for you to finish what you are doing.
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