- May 20, 2013
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I'm hoping that some of you wise peeps may be able to give me some advice.
We have 2 pairs of gorgeous white call ducks. Recently the two females have been sitting on nests, which has been very exciting, but unfortunately a couple of weeks ago we had a wild duck come on to the pond with her ducklings. We thought that was fine, until I realised that one of the call duck females was off her nest and when I investigated, it was because the wild duck had pushed her off and was on the nest with her ducklings!
Unfortunately, they'd crushed two of the eggs.
I scared them off the nest and watched to see what would happen, Mummy call duck went straight back on the nest but again was scared off by the wild duck. I've no idea why the wild duck was trying to get on her nest, but she was clearly determined to push the call duck off it.
I wasn't sure what to do, but after the third time of scaring the wild duck off and her returning straight away, I decided to take the remaining eggs (which were stone cold) and put them in our incubator (which was already up and running with a couple of batches of chicken eggs). I didn't expect anything as the eggs were so cold and I didn't know how long the mother had been off them, plus I know call ducks are notoriously hard to hatch.
But to my delight, out of the 6 remaining eggs we now have 2 ducklings this morning and another 2 that have pipped and may well hatch.
So my question is, what do I do with these ducklings? Do I hand rear them, and reintroduce them to the other call ducks in the garden in a few weeks time? Or is there any chance I could take them out earlier to give them the best chance of imprinting on their actual mother rather than me?
Help! Any advice very gratefully received as hatching ducks is a new one on me!
We have 2 pairs of gorgeous white call ducks. Recently the two females have been sitting on nests, which has been very exciting, but unfortunately a couple of weeks ago we had a wild duck come on to the pond with her ducklings. We thought that was fine, until I realised that one of the call duck females was off her nest and when I investigated, it was because the wild duck had pushed her off and was on the nest with her ducklings!
Unfortunately, they'd crushed two of the eggs.
I wasn't sure what to do, but after the third time of scaring the wild duck off and her returning straight away, I decided to take the remaining eggs (which were stone cold) and put them in our incubator (which was already up and running with a couple of batches of chicken eggs). I didn't expect anything as the eggs were so cold and I didn't know how long the mother had been off them, plus I know call ducks are notoriously hard to hatch.
But to my delight, out of the 6 remaining eggs we now have 2 ducklings this morning and another 2 that have pipped and may well hatch.
So my question is, what do I do with these ducklings? Do I hand rear them, and reintroduce them to the other call ducks in the garden in a few weeks time? Or is there any chance I could take them out earlier to give them the best chance of imprinting on their actual mother rather than me?
Help! Any advice very gratefully received as hatching ducks is a new one on me!
