Dutch Hookbill Hatch!

[Pyxis]

I've been looking for Dutch Hookbills for awhile; I'm fascinated with anything odd or unusual in the poultry world, and the hookbills certainly fit the bill. However, they are critically endangered, according to The Livestock Conservancy, and that makes them very hard to find.

Finally I got lucky and found someone who has a flock and who would sell me eggs. So, 23 eggs arrived to my house. Upon unpacking, unfortunately the post office had managed to crack four of them, leaving 19 intact.

So, 19 eggs went into my incubator. 13 days later, 16 of those eggs are developing!

Hopefully in 15 days, they will start hatching. Fingers crossed!

 

[Pyxis]

Look at how cute we are:

 

[Pyxis]

We have two ducklings!

The two that I have been assisting are still hanging in there, absorbing, and getting ready to come out.

Here is the oddly positioned one. I know it doesn't look too weird, but he's twisted up in there, and I had to come down the side of the egg to find him, as you can see:

Unfortunately I did lose one. One of the ones that I did a safety hole for since it hadn't externally pipped. I really can't say why it died.

 

[Pyxis]

We have lots of ducklings this morning! The brooder has ended up being shared with some brahma chicks that I didn't think were hatching for another few days, thanks to Hatch Keeper being weird, but ah well. I'll get them separated soon, I don't like chicks in with ducks when brooding, too wet for them.

But! Eleven are out, all on their own.

The weird duckling did die Never finished absorbing everything, and passed away. The other malpo is still working on absorbing. Two more eggs are still taking their time. I've slightly opened up the shells to check on them. One is one that never externally pipped, and I don't think it'll make it out on its own, but it seems like it's nearly ready to come out now.

The other one is just a slowpoke and has lots of absorbing left to do.

Better pictures to come!

 

[WannaBeHillBilly]

We need to wait for another two weeks! - ¿Where is the fast-forward button?!

 

[RosemaryDuck]

Wow, this is my first time hearing of this breed. So unique looking! Crossing my fingers for you that you get high hatch rates and they do well!

As another user above stated it would be amazing if you could sell hatching eggs as well in a few years.

 

[WannaBeHillBilly]

OMG! I think i will explode!
I just routinely looked in the local Craigslist-page for duck eggs - just check for competitors - when i stumbled upon this: [ https://swv.craigslist.org/grd/d/freeman-duck-hatching-eggs-dutch/7292951191.html ]

Clicked on this and now my day is ruined!!!

That SOB is crossbreeding Dutch Hookbills with Barnyard surprise ducks and selling the eggs. I am loosing it!

That is exactly the reason why i don't have Hookbill ducks now, despite having received a couple of offers! I cannot accommodate two separate flocks of ducks at the moment and crossbreeding a rare endangered breed with other breeds is exactly the reason why this breed became rare and endangered! This offer sounds exactly like a duckling mill!

@Pyxis if you look at those ducks, do they really look like Hookbills? Those three mallard colored drakes maybe, but definitely not clean bread…

 

[Pyxis]

Did a quick candle this morning. Everyone is still coming along!

 

[WannaBeHillBilly]

Congratulations!
That is so awesome! These ducklings could not be in better hands than yours.
You are the Hatchi Wan Kenobi!

And the hatching problems are the reason why Metzer Farms gave up on the Dutch Hookbill. I have an e-mail from John Metzer in which he says that they had a hatch rate under 50% due to mal-positioning of the ducklings. And in those large commercial hatchers there is no Pyxis to assist. You hatch or you die…

 

[Pyxis]

Do the curved bills develop or are they what they are at hatch?

They start off looking normal and then curve. There are degrees of curving, and Holderread recommends not breeding ducks with extreme curves together, as he found that in such breedings fertility was only about 50%.