Geese lay for how many years???

We recently adopted a pair of geeseadopted a pair of geese. The female is about 5 years old. I was just told that she might not be laying anymore. This isn't a problem, though we would love goose eggs. But, it got me wondering how many years do geese lay. I tried searching online, but didn't find much info.



This article was focused on production geese, and said they lay for four years, with the least eggs in the fourth year... but these geese are only kept for four years https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/agricultural-and-biological-sciences/geese

Commercially raised breeder geese are usually kept for four consecutive seasons. Young geese usually do not come into lay before 9 months of age, with the typical age of maturity at 2 years of age. Too early of an onset of reproductive maturity (first oviposition in females) may adversely affect their reproductive performance during subsequent years (Biesiada-Drzazga, 2014). Reproductive performance declines with age, with the fewest eggs laid during the forth year of production

Looking at Backyard Chicken Keepers, there was report of a 19 year old African goose that laid for 16 years, and a half greylag/half domestic goose that was 40 years old and laid for 26 years :o

That's a huge differences in numbers of laying years! If you have geese--or know of someone else who has geese--can you tell me what type they are and how many years they've been/had laid eggs?

(Since I thing polls are fun, and I can make them, I'm making one! But, please comment below with what you know, too!)

Well, our geese are obviously still young enough to lay! We got our first egg today!



It's fun to compare them to our duck (the white, grey and blue/green eggs) to our chickens (Rhode Island Red is the light brown. Dark brown is Black Star Layer)

Last vote in apple poll was on March 13, 2020

I have not seen your original post till now, glad you have goose eggs.

Mine are 10 years old, and still laying eggs.

I wish they’d stop. I could do without the eggs, but even more so I could do without the noise and aggression this time of year. I have two ganders, and they both like the same girl...

We have an old pair - Grandpa and Grandma, I call them.  We've had them 4 years now, they came with the house and were a few years old when we moved in.  She lays just fine... enough for 2 clutches each season if I keep picking up eggs.  She'll lay about a dozen, then get all ornery and angry, but if I don't let her set, she'll lay another dozen or so.  We've had good fertility, but she can't hatch eggs, not sure what her issue is.  Grandpa happily adopts all the young ducklings and goslings that I incubate, and they rear them together from about the age they start to feather out util they are basically grown.

We have 1 goose and she has been laying for 10 years, we found her in our front lawn. Weeks later her partner showed up. Sadly he pastaway 4 years ago and she morned for over a year, it just broke our hearts. For the last 2 years she has only layer 5 eggs, she used to lay up to 25 to 28 eggs, we are not sure how old she is because she was fully grown when she landed on front lawn.

Hi Henny,

Welcome to Permies.