Always the runt?

[Snipes]

I hatched 6 ducks, 3 of which went to some friends of mine, and I kept three. I had 9 eggs, 5 of which were hand turned and 4 were in an auto turner to test the results. All 5 hand turned eggs hatched, but only one of the auto turned eggs hatched. The other three eggs had complete looking ducklings but they were small and still had a yolk sac. The one who hatched from the auto turner, his/her name is Tethys, was helped out. She pipped and started zipping almost immediately, but then stopped and wasnt doing anything over the next 24 hours. She did not pip or respond to my calls to her and seemed to have given up completely. After another 6 hours I decided to help her out. I could hear popping in her breathing (which is now gone

) and I basically birthed her. I got the entire shell off and the white part underneath so that essentially she was in a lil "placenta" and then i squeezed her out. There were no veins attached to the inner wall or anything, I think she just was too tired and weak to make it out and she probably would have died if I did not help her out. I can't believe she made it through the night, but she did. She was then, and still is smaller than the other two I have, and her feather/fur is a bit ratty and she does not fluff out like the other two. Will she catch up? Will she ever fluff up? In addition, Tethys is not attached to the other two as much. The other two will protest madly if separated, but I can bring Tethys into another room and play with her alone and she does not put up a huge fuss (though the other two seem a little upset). They are all about two weeks now. Any ideas?

 

[Featherland]

Wow, that is interesting about the hand-turning verses auto-turner. I don't know about ducks but with chicks sometimes runts will stay that way and sometimes they will grow normally. I had one really tiny weak blue silkie grow to be the healthiest and feistiest of the bunch.

 

[Snipes]

Personally, as long as (s)he is healthy, I would love to have a runt. Sooo cute. But I am a bit perplexed by the rattiness and why she is not so attached to the other ducks. They don't pick on her

 

[Featherland]

He/she probably imprinted on you instead of the other ducklings. I don't know why it would be ratty looking. Maybe could use extra vitamins. Did you take the eggs out of the turner 3 days before hatch day?

 

[RAREROO]

I normally do not have any luck hatching duck eggs in my incubator, and especially in the hovabator, but I had a duck setting some her own eggs and I wanted her to set some shipped eggs for me becuase natural incubation usually does better. So I took her eggs and gave her the shipped eggs and I put her eggs in my hovabator along with some turkey and chicken eggs. This is a still air hovabator and I did not put any water in it nor did I turn the eggs even once during the 3 weeks they were in there and I think most all of those duck eggs hatched, there was a couple that I helped out and one I did too early and it bled a lot and I didnt think it would make it, but it did and it is a runt but is still doing good, but all the others were bigger and more active than any that I have ever hatched when I turn the eggs and put water in the bator. And I was even able to adopt them back to their mother when then they were a couple days old.