What is Goose Egg Addling?

Goose egg addling is one of the most humane methods for population control for geese and other birds. Although for many years, extended hunting seasons have been the norm for controlling population, egg addling is rapidly becoming more popular with animal rights advocates and humane scientific research.

Although not as cost effective as hunting, which basically costs the scientific or farming community nothing at all, as the hunters do all the work for them, and do it willingly; it is considered a gentler way of controlling growing populations of geese and other wild birds.

Basically, the egg addling method consists of stealing the eggs from nest, stopping the development of the embryo, and putting the egg back in the nest before the mother goose suspects any foul play. This ruse is necessary so that the goose continues to sit on the egg, because when she notices that the eggs are not going to hatch, she will simply destroy those eggs and lay some more. For this it is essential that the egg does not change in color, smell or integrity. Any tiny suspicion from the mother goose, and she will simply start again.

It has to look and smell exactly as it did before. Everyone knows that geese can become quite aggressive, some people even argue that they are better than guard dogs. The fact is that they will fight you with beak, tooth and claw if they get wind of any danger to their precious eggs, so egg addlers have their work cut out for them as they try to keep the goose population under control.

There are many ways of addling an egg. One of them is to shake it vigorously, but you run the risk of it slipping out of your fingers and smashing, thus defeating the purposing of addling in the first place. One of the most common methods is to coat the egg with corn oil, preventing oxygen from entering the shell, and suffocating the embryo. But addling does have to be done humanely, so if the egg floats, the embryo is too developed to be addled without causing distress to the chick inside, it must be allowed to live.

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