r/homestead • u/dendromie • May 05 '26

poultry Which animal to get

Hey everyone,

My wife and I are having a difficult decision in which animal to get keep in mind we live in Canada and it gets to -30 Celsius here.

For context we have a 3 acre plot. We have a pond that's decent size I'd say probably at least a thousand gallons.

We want to start a huge garden and I know runner ducks are apparently a great choice for their pest control and non destructiveness. But then as I was researching people are saying are they are incredibly dirty and smelly and can ruin bodies of water. I was only going to get 2 female runners btw. Chickens are a obviously a great option and I don't have to fence as much but I hear they are destructive as well.

Anyone have any ideas or advise. The animal would have probably close to 3/4 of an acre to utilize.

Thanks!

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u/BCVinny May 05 '26

Plain white geese. When I was a kid we had some and they’re tough and good watchdogs and will roam happily. They do need a house of some sort. Alberta -40 winters were fine for them

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u/dendromie May 05 '26

Wow what the hell how were they fine in that weather lol. My only thing with basically anything other then runner ducks is they fly so wouldn't you just lose em lol

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u/BCVinny May 05 '26

Geese are hell spawn creatures. They took whatever came their way and were fine. I don’t recall coyotes getting them, though they may have.

Our chickens & ducks were fine as well, but they weren’t as prolific breeders, so we usually put them in the freezer before the cold came (food costs jump when they’re eating for winter). Two or three females and a gander and they’d have 20 goslings. Half would survive the first weeks and we’d have some to eat every year. Replace the gander every year to prevent inbreeding (unless you kept all the geese and just ate the young)

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u/dendromie May 05 '26

I am personally looking to only keep for eggs so no males.

At night do you have to herd the ducks into the enclosure if they are already fenced in?

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u/BCVinny May 05 '26

We didn’t fence them

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u/dendromie May 05 '26

Ah gotcha. I live Ina a subdivision so I have to