Duck hatched her own eggs. How to care for them?

[Isabella Mcadams]

Hi all, my kahki Campbell is hatching a clutch of her own eggs, and so far everything is going great. The mama is semi-free range (she’s in a large fenced-in area during the day that I move around the yard every few days) and I feed her layer pellets everyday.

What do I need to do? Do I need to put out starter/grower for the ducklings? Or just let mama take care of all that? Also, there’s a plastic tub with rims about 10 inches high for the adult ducks’ water. Do I need to put out a duckling waterer or a small dish for the ducklings?

 

[Miss Lydia]

Yes mama and duckling can eat starter grower I actually feed it to my whole flock once mama and duckling are out with everyone. You want duckling to have a small waterer they can’t climb into and mama a deep one the duckling can’t get into. Is her and her duckling in the fence by themselves. It’s just always a good idea to keep mom and ducklings separated until the ducklings are around 2-3 weeks old drakes and sometimes adult females can’t be trusted around ducklings. Fix their place where everyone can see each other but mom and ducklings are safe. Congrats to you and mama. Be sure to post pics when you can

 

[Isabella Mcadams]

Yes mama and duckling can eat starter grower I actually feed it to my whole flock once mama and duckling are out with everyone. You want duckling to have a small waterer they can’t climb into and mama a deep one the duckling can’t get into. Is her and her duckling in the fence by themselves. It’s just always a good idea to keep mom and ducklings separated until the ducklings are around 2-3 weeks old drakes and sometimes adult females can’t be trusted around ducklings. Fix their place where everyone can see each other but mom and ducklings are safe. Congrats to you and mama. Be sure to post pics when you can

Thanks so much! The only other duck is the father. He’s usually pretty good around ducklings, but if he gets aggressive I’ll separate them.

 

[Miss Lydia]

My Muscovy drake is terrified of any ducklings hatched here it’s quite hilarious too since he weighs about 15lbs. But I still keep mom and babes in their own space for a couple weeks before letting them out around the other birds. How many did she hatch?

 

[Isabella Mcadams]

My Muscovy drake is terrified of any ducklings hatched here it’s quite hilarious too since he weighs about 15lbs. But I still keep mom and babes in their own space for a couple weeks before letting them out around the other birds. How many did she hatch?

I can’t quite tell yet, but at least 7or 8. This morning when I let the duck out, he was acting really crazy, jumping around like he had the zoomies lol, maybe he was celebrating his fatherhood!

I’m on a snake stake-out right now; a rat snake got in to the duck house twice this morning with duckling on the menu. Started swallowing one just as I ran out there, but I whacked it with a stick and it let go and slithered away before I could get a shovel. I’ll get it this time

 

[Isabella Mcadams]

Got him

 

[Isabella Mcadams]

Thanks y’all for your help! Mama’s doing good with 8 babies total

 

[Miss Lydia]

How precious is that

 

[Miss Lydia]

Oh my gosh snakes. We had a huge blk rat snake get one of ours one year I was able to save it too. Thank goodness.they sure are precious.

 

[Luv Ducks]

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Thanks y’all for your help! Mama’s doing good with 8 babies total

Such Precious Babies!!!!!