HELP! Need to incubate duck eggs

[fuzziecreatures]

My mallard duck decided to go lay her eggs in the neighbors yard because I kept taking them from her. I wasn't really planning on having more mallards. Well she has been missing for a week, coming back for meals so I knew what she was doing. I found her nest this weekend. She was sitting on 16 of her eggs and 3 of her sisters (they have different colors). She was home this morning and is still home this afternoon so I went to check her nest. On the way to check her nest, the neighbor informed me there were several egg shells in the yard. So luckily she was able to get away, unlike her other sister a month ago.

I have a Circulating Air Incubator with turner that I used to hatch chicken eggs last year with great success. There are 11 eggs left and I've never hatched duck eggs. I had read somewhere about misting and cooling the eggs?
I candled them and they appear to be about 5-7 days. Some are smaller than others.

 

[txcarl1258]

99.5 degrees and humidity around 30%. Humidity levels may need to be raised if your air cells grow too quickly. I mist mine once per day. This has worked well for me in the past.

 

[fuzziecreatures]

Eggs are progressing nicely. Since I'm cooling them and misting them daily, it is a great time to candle the eggs. Yesterday I only saw 2 babies moving in the eggs. Today it is all of them! Hopefully they all hatch. 3 of the eggs are from my duck that was attacked and died. The other 8 are from my last adult duck.
I have at least 3 other ducks but they are only about 8-10 weeks old. Waiting on the runners to see if either of those are female.

 

[fuzziecreatures]

Based on the fact the ducklings were taking up the entire egg, I put them into lockdown on Thursday. Nothing yet and no movement in the eggs so I panicked and candled them this am. They are still alive and their air cells look wonderful, they have tilted and it looks like some are trying to pip into it (or it was just them moving around)! The little buggers are gonna hatch while I'm busy at work this week ******! Isn't that always the way.
There were a few eggs that were lagging behind in development so I've been hand turning those and the ones that fill up get moved over to the stop turning side of the incubator. There are 2 left that I still need to turn at least tonight, we'll see how they candle tonight.

There are 10 eggs. I had 11 saved from the nest. 1 cracked one that I had put wax on it during incubation, scraped it off for lockdown. 1 egg just quit one day. It had candled alive the day before and the next, it wasn't moving and the vessels had receded. I did an eggtopsy and it looked like a normal duckling on the outside.

 

[fuzziecreatures]

There was still nothing this am but a huge spike in humidity. Didn't know if it was related to the weather outside or internal pips. Humidity was 78% so I opened it up to let out some moisture. Came home today to 2 pipped eggs, no progress before bed. We'll see in the am.

 

[fuzziecreatures]

Came home from grocery shopping to a baby


Imprinting


Sleepy baby

BTW, it is 77* in the house and I am a very warm person