Duck won’t come out

[Tom1909]

So I have a female mallard and recently she started laying eggs. My mom started taking these eggs for cooking, etc. And she also put up some small fences to protect her flowers. But now, she’s “hiding” in her “nest” and won’t come out, she’s also not eating. Any ideas?

 

[sourland]

It sounds as if she has gone broody.

 

[Tom1909]

It sounds as if she has gone broody.

Hmmm... if so, what can I do to fix that? And what caused it?

 

[sourland]

To 'fix' it you must block her off from her nest. What 'caused' it is hormones and the desire to set and hatch ducklings. It's an absolutely normal state required for the continuation of the species.

 

[casportpony]

It sounds as if she has gone broody.

To 'fix' it you must block her off from her nest. What 'caused' it is hormones and the desire to set and hatch ducklings. It's an absolutely normal state required for the continuation of the species.

Good advice!

 

[sylviethecochin]

Hormones and the wish for baby duckies caused it. Is she actually sitting on any eggs? Is there a male? If so, she'll fix herself--in four weeks, when babies hatch.

If there is no male and no peeps, she may starve herself to death on the nest. Either get some ducklings (day-old) for her and slip them under at night, or break the broodiness, generally by blockading her from the nest and/or isolating her in a wire-bottomed cage for a week.
EDT: x2, Sourland. Didn't see your post.

 

[Ravynscroft]

X3 sourland and sylviethecochin...

She wants babies, lol...

 

[Pyxis]

Yep, I agree with all the above. If she has a mate and is on eggs and you leave her alone, in four weeks you'll have more ducks. If you don't want that to happen, destroy the nest or block her off from it.

Do you have any other ducks? If so and they share a nest with her, make sure if you're going to let her hatch that you mark all the ones she has now and remove any new ones each day.

 

[chickens really]

Ducks are easy..Collect eggs and destroy the nest..

 

[LoveChooks9000]

Do you want to have ducklings? If you don't have a drake, you can find places on the net to buy duck eggs, and you can put them under her. If you have a drake and there are eggs under her already, you can just leave her and as everyone above says, you will have ducklings soon enough. Good luck.

ETA:- Sorry....Forgot it was winter in the U.S.. (I'm in Australia). Yep, I agree with another person who posted after me that it's not a great idea to let her continue to be broody in winter! Cheers.