Determining whose gosling is whose

Goslings

My way of determining who a gosling's parents are is not 100% certain but I have noticed various things that can help in making a guess of who it could be. Usually, you cannot tell who the parents of a gosling is when they are young. As they grow you can see the similarities to one of the parents or both of them. I notice their mother's characteristics but perhaps the gander's shows up too. Cherry, one of my ganders, is one of the only geese who looks more like his father than his mother. Catalpa - the biggest goose I ever had - looked like both his father and mother. ​​​I have had quite a few ganders who I could not tell who their parents might be. There are also the extremely obvious geese who there is no doubt who their parents are. 

ThThe two most important things to me when I am determining who a goose's parents are is voice and expressions. Geese do not all make the same expressions. Other things that are important are personality, shape, size, headshape, coloring on the head, coloring on the body, and coloring of the feet. Females also vary greatly when they nest and many of the things that make them vary greatly are inherited from their mothers. A female will usually be as good as their mother while there are some who are better or worse. The shape of the egg laid by a female may very well look like their mother's. That would be harder to tell because they usually are just round. Some geese will have longer eggs, smaller eggs, pointier eggs, very round eggs, or irregularly shaped eggs. There is so much variety in each individual things. 

There are also geese who look a lot like one of their parents. Sometimes there is one that resembles both. Some of them will act a lot like their parents as well. I am also incidentally breeding for geese who lay earlier in the year as well. When a goose lays also varies! Although, I have found no correlation of laying times between mother and daughter. 

Goslings from a particular goose may tend to look similar in color and size as well. This may prove to be a good way to find out the parents of a gosling. Once you know how a gosling tends to look from a particular goose. This can be done by keeping an eye on who lays where, taking eggs as soon as they are laid, and selecting that goose's eggs for incubation and only hers so as not to mix them up during hatch.

One of Sugar Maple's goslings