Incubating please help

[JadeComputerGal]

My duck is back on her nest full time with out her baby. I'm worries about giving her eggs back.. But I would like to see her have some babies. I think I'm really screwing this mess up, there is a lot of activity in her nest. The other girl duck lays a new egg in it every day, and my boy ducks are so fascinated with what she is doing. In wondering if they are breaking eggs. Would it be better to let the eggs be in the incubator or trying and get them back under mom and hope that she stays the course?

I certainly wouldn't go that way. The mom doesn't sound like she's reliably broody, and you'll lose the babies if she's on again/off again. We hatch almost all ours in an incubator. I think you're going to have better luck with something you can control because there's no way I know of to force a duck to be broody.

 

[casie]

Would it be possible to put the momma in the brooder and let her have her babies at that point?

 

[aa3655]

Would it be possible to isolate the hen sitting on the nest so that the others can't disturb her? If you were able to do that, I think I would return the eggs to her.

 

[casie]

She has made her nest in a planter that is difficult to fence in. We have thought about trying to fence her in so that the other couldn't bother her, but she picked a weird spot for her nest and it tricky to isolate her

 

[Lacrystol]

I have candeled them and they are at all different stages the ones that looked like the picture of close to 28 days I stopped turning. My incubator stays at 99 to 100 but I have been trying to keep humidity at like 60 to 65 but so far it's been a little up and a little down. I don't have a fan. Yesterday I had one poke it's beak through. And I sat all day with it hopping it would make it and realities the urge to help it after reading many posts here. It was working hard and chirping and I went to take a shower, when I came back it was dead. I don't know what I'm doing wrong but I really want to help these babies hatch.

I have one that is rocking so I'm hoping it will start to pip soon. I want to make sure this guy lives I have lost 3 now.. And one that was 4 days old. I don't know what could have happened. Any advice on the humidity setting for both incubating and hatching?

RAISE your temp, it needs to be about 102, LOWER the humidity. having the humidity at 60-65 that's for lockdown, you can't lock them down, you have other eggs in there with different due dates. It's only going to cause MORE issue with the others.

 

[Lacrystol]

You're okay, Casie. Don't panic. The temp is fine, and the humidity is fine for hatch. It's too high for the days about 3 days prior to hatch. You want to try to get that down to no more than 50%, and I do 40-45%. I think @Lacrystol does even lower than that.

When you said one of them poked the bill through, do you mean it pipped internally, meaning it broke through the internal membrane, or do you mean it broke through its shell?

Temp is not ok, she has no fan, so it needs to be higher around 101-102.

Humidity needs to be around 50 -55 ONLY because she has no clue of the due dates of each egg and from what I understand there are many eggs in there with different due dates.

 

[Lacrystol]

I'm not sure what to to about the humidity because some of my eggs are really early like day 6 or 7 and some of them are piping. This litte guy broke through the shell and was trying to work it's way around but did not make it I wish I had helped

What do you have as flooring? He looks to wet? The membrane is very very wet. Need to get that humidity down.

 

[Lacrystol]

Woul building a second incubator be the best bet? I had 2 die in their shells that one last night and one the day before. I had a little one who was piping so I thought maybe my duck would keep sitting if she heard it. The duck took the egg right away but in the middle of the day I came out to find a dead baby with it's been half way out. So I decided not to try that again.

yep you can't do that because that egg is in lock down, your momma duck is not. They know when it's hatching time so there body temp makes the adjustments.

 

[Lacrystol]

My duck is back on her nest full time with out her baby. I'm worries about giving her eggs back.. But I would like to see her have some babies. I think I'm really screwing this mess up, there is a lot of activity in her nest. The other girl duck lays a new egg in it every day, and my boy ducks are so fascinated with what she is doing. In wondering if they are breaking eggs. Would it be better to let the eggs be in the incubator or trying and get them back under mom and hope that she stays the course?

Keep your eggs in the bator, let her have new eggs, she may reject those eggs that are in the bator. Work with your bator to make adjustments to have a better hatching.

 

[Lacrystol]

Would it be possible to put the momma in the brooder and let her have her babies at that point?

She may reject them..