Broody hen hatching duck eggs?

[larkflying]

Just curious - do any of you try to have a broody hen hatch out ducks? I've got a broody silkie and I would much rather have Welsh Harlequin Ducklings than mixed bantam chicks . . . do you mist the eggs to compensate for the hen not taking a bath every day? How many should I put under a Silkie? (I was tempted to put a goose egg under her, but reluctantly decided that I'd better go with duck eggs . . .)

I'm probably going to take the ducklings away from her if / when they hatch as I doubt she can cope with the duckies messy tendencies - plus I'd like to have them tamer than my current ducks, who are friendly but not extremely sociable.

Thanks for any help!

 

[featherfooted]

I've had better luck with Chickens hatching duck eggs than the ducks. I didn't do any thing different. Was pretty funny seeing my Silkie with 3 ducklings almost as big as she is.

 

[Miss Lydia]

Just curious - do any of you try to have a broody hen hatch out ducks? I've got a broody silkie and I would much rather have Welsh Harlequin Ducklings than mixed bantam chicks . . . do you mist the eggs to compensate for the hen not taking a bath every day? How many should I put under a Silkie? (I was tempted to put a goose egg under her, but reluctantly decided that I'd better go with duck eggs . . .)

I'm probably going to take the ducklings away from her if / when they hatch as I doubt she can cope with the duckies messy tendencies - plus I'd like to have them tamer than my current ducks, who are friendly but not extremely sociable.

Thanks for any help!

One of my hens started sitting on some duck eggs but since they were Muscovy and I hated for my hen to have to sit for 35 days I took them and gave her some chicken eggs, they hatched last Friday and she is very happy and my muscovy took the eggs the hen was sitting on so happy all around.

 

[Ilovemyduckies]

My aunt had a chicken hatch a duck egg. It worked out just fine

 

[Shamrock4]

I have had chickens hatch duck eggs before - very funny to see duckling heads poking out of a fluffy chicken - and she raised them till they were fully feathered - but it did get a little hard for her to cover them all in the end as they were pekins and she was a cochin bantam! She loved them though!! The only problem is that a mother duck oils down her babies before they leave the nest so they dont get waterlogged when they go swimming. A chicken cant do that so I wouldnt let the ducklings swim untill they are good at preening themselves, or else they might get chilled. At the moment I have a duck egg under a hen and it will be hatching in 2 weeks!! Good luck with your babies!

 

[cukooformarans]

Ditto ... I have a hen that hatched out 12 muscovy just fine. She hatched 12 out of 14 and the other two showed absolutely no signs of development, so I would have to say that was pretty good. This particular hen actually ran the muscovy away from the nest after the muscovy had been setting for two weeks, so she only had to set 3 weeks. Funny how the timing worked out. They hatched last weekend and she hasn't lost a single one. Biggest thing is keeping them out of the water.

 

[larkflying]

Oh, I'm excited now . . . thanks very much for your encouragement. Now I'm going to be hoping for more broody hens . . .

 

[mandelyn]

I've threatened all my hens with duck eggs if they go broody. No broodies yet! Some were starting to set a little longer in the box when there was a decent pile of eggs in there on a good laying day. I told them...

"You better get off that nest before you find yourself with ducks."

They can do it fine, though they get a little huffy when the ducklings take off for puddles.

 

[larkflying]

Well, my second Black Jersey Giant has gone broody -- had no idea that breed had broody tendencies -- but they are the only full sized chickens I have that are broody at all -- even the cochins never went broody.

Now, I have to decide duck eggs or goose eggs . . . . duck eggs or goose eggs . . . I have lots of geese sitting, but so far none of them are producing any goslings. On the other hand, I want more ducks for eggs, so I think I'll go with ducks . . . how exciting!

I'm going to keep the Jersey Giants now -- I can see that every year I'll have them hatching out all kinds of eggs, poor chickens . . .

 

[Mum]

I have a pekin bantam sitting on 2 ducks eggs (which will be due for hatch in a couple of weeks). She began with four eggs, but they were too big for her little body and when I candled, one of them had to be disposed of. Yesterday morning, another egg had to be disposed off because it was cold and had been out of the nest too long. Not her fault, one of the other bantams had chosen to use the broody's space to lay her own egg

Now the bantam is on her own with her pair of eggs and I'm