I think she's had about 23-24 eggs & then I bought (when she only had one egg) 6 pekins eggs from eBay. Her nest is perfect! She spends a lot of time making it just right and then before they are let out into the big yard and their little swimming pool, she covers them all up with extra hay. I really think she has about 30 eggs now. She sets on them all night but I have to heard her and her *husband* back into their little area after about an hour. I thought if they were just right there, she might get bored and set. I'm sure some of those bottom layer eggs have got to be rotten! What would you do? I was really looking forward to ducklings & so were my grandkids. Even my granddaughter's friends stop by on their own to ask if the ducks hatched yet. I used to turn them for her until there got to be 2 layers of eggs. I candled them once too when she might have had about 18. I saw "blobs" in some of them - one I could even see a couple of veins, which my husband verified. The blobs were all on the bottom of the egg, the way it was lying, which is why I started turning them. This is her first year of laying eggs. Her hubby used to run at me like he was a pit bull but I just pick him up - I think that might be insulting him! Lately, with the warm weather here on the border of North Dakota, I sit out in the duck area, just holding him in my lap and stroking him. He's chilled out a little bit since I started doing that. I'm used to geese and half the time, he forgets to open his mouth so he just pokes you with his bill! haha But the children are scared when he runs at them, so... Well, I didn't mean to go on about him!! I would love suggestions about her going for the world record of eggs that she just sleeps on.... I had a rotten goose egg explode in my face while I was incubating (I loaned my incubator to a friend for this summer - didn't think I'd have a problem.) Oh my goodness, - that IS why they say things about last one in is a rotten egg. I was wetting my hands and rubbing them over each egg and then turning them in the incubator, when ka-bam! a goose grenade exploded. Face, hair, clothing, the ceiling, kitchen table, counter tops and the floor. I think that smell was far worse than a skunk. Just gray gel type clinging liquid. You never forget something like that! ps What should I do about all the duck eggs?
My ducks and geese sit like this, during the warm part of the day, they cover the eggs good, and go out to play/swim. This only goes on for the first few weeks, and then the last little while they leave the eggs alone less and less until hatch. Is she spending ALL day out, or just a few hours during the warm part of the day?
Personally, I'd take all the eggs and discard them. Give her a nest full of fakes (golf balls might work). Keep the ones she lays in a carton in a cool place (about 60 degrees). Tip the carton slightly and change the angle a couple of times a day. When she gets serious about setting, trade for the eggs you've been saving. I rarely have one actually hatch eggs until she's two, but others have better luck. You can keep eggs like that for a week or so and have a good hatching rate. You can eat them as they go past ten days in a cool room with no problem, they won't start developing until they are under the duck and they won't go "bad" for weeks. When I'm saving to hatch, I write on them with a pencil the date and rotate and eat them as they rotate out. I'm kinda waiting for my girls to start setting, though they usually start in May here. I keep hoping!
Thank you for the suggestions! She has built THE best nest in the world. Really, it is very impressive. It's a little taller than she is. She has been setting continually for about a week now. I didn't see the reply about removing the old eggs, so I think there are a good 30 eggs that she's sitting on! I've never seen a picture of ducks with 30 ducklings! But this is my first attempt at ducks, so... I leave the duck area gate open to the large yard and their swimming pool and occasionally she will come out and bathe and root around but she hurries back to her nest. A couple of days when she didn't get off the nest, I slowly and gently forced her off her nest into the large yard & then she did bathe and root around some. I give them freeze dried worms as a treat and put a handful in the pool (I change the water every day) and then sprinkle some around the yard, to give them something to do, I guess!! I didn't know duck eggs would stay good that long. If some hatch and some don't, what will she probably do? I've only seen one egg that she pushed out of the nest and then somehow (maybe one of them stepped on it or maybe one of them pecked at it, but it was broken open and one of them must have picked it up and put it in their tub of drinking water. I'm glad I saw it right away - I don't know why they would put it in their water.
