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Chicks, ducks, All are welcome!
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100Acre said:
Hey everybody!! I finally jumped on the band wagon:wee I’ve been glued to these forums for weeks now! I’m so happy I joined!! I’ve been incubating mallard eggs (first timer). So, of course I’m anxiety ridden and full of questions. I stumbled upon this forum and with the help of several threads, I successfully hatched six little ducklings!! I read and re-read the VERY informative assisted hatch thread. My hat goes off to you... that is the best written and most informative read out there!!! I had to assist two who had pipped at the wrong end. I let them go for 32 hours after the external pip but chose to intervene when I noticed there was dried and sticky looking stuff around the hole. It went perfect!! Very long process but so worth it. I’m not completely out of the woods yet though; I have eight more to go in a second incubator.
Shall we have a very long backstory? We shall...
So I decided to plunge into the chicken world head first. Me and my kiddos went to pick out six chicks. I decided six was a nice even number to start with. If these went off with a bang I was going to add more the following spring. We returned from our local tractor supply store with six chicks and four ducks. I couldn’t help it. With the ducks and chicks in their brooders, I went to work on the coop. I refused the help of the hubby. I wanted to do this myself.
Fast forward to “adulthood”... chickens are amazing! The love is mutual; they jump into my arms, take naps in my lap... you get the picture. The ducks are much the same. We ended up with three drakes and only one female (that poor, poor female). She started laying eggs like the easter bunny. Sporadically all over the yard. I let her go for nine days to see if she would gather them into a pile. Three days go by with no new eggs. I started walking the wood line in search of a nest, nothing. The next day I let my pooch out like I always do but this morning the ducks flocked out from under the porch. Sure enough, she had a nest built with four eggs nicely tucked in. I gather the nine eggs in the yard and set them up in the house. She wasn’t sitting yet on the other four so I knew if the original nine went much longer, fertility would plummet. So off to the tractor supply for an incubator! Everything was set up properly. Seven days later, I had six wiggly embryos! Three were not viable.
Fast forward a few days... the ducks decided to go visit our neighbor. A bit like “Over the River and Through the Woods” type. Two drakes came back bloody. The other two didn’t come back at all. I was devastated. It was all my fault, I let them free range during the day. They had plenty of room to forage without running out of real estate (so I thought). That night we had our first frost of the season. I was already bummed about my feather babies and now I had the only remaining piece of her sit in frost for hours! My hubby came home that evening with a second incubator to try and cheer me up (love him!). So I thought “What the hell!”. I gathered the eggs and let them set up for a few days, stuck them in the incubator and crossed all my fingers and toes. Guess what? All eight have wiggly little embryos in them!!! We’re currently at day 14 for the second batch.
To wrap this up, we currently have 12 chickens laying, eight embryos squirming, six ducklings peeping, four guineas squawking, two ducks not foraging, and a fur baby living happily!! If you’ve made it this far, thanks for reading!!!
Click to expand...
WOW!!!!
How many birds are going to be in your coop?
Welcome to BYC.
You have come to the right place to have ALL your questions answered.
We are Egg-cited you joined.
 
100Acre said:
Hey everybody!! I finally jumped on the band wagon:wee I’ve been glued to these forums for weeks now! I’m so happy I joined!! I’ve been incubating mallard eggs (first timer). So, of course I’m anxiety ridden and full of questions. I stumbled upon this forum and with the help of several threads, I successfully hatched six little ducklings!! I read and re-read the VERY informative assisted hatch thread. My hat goes off to you... that is the best written and most informative read out there!!! I had to assist two who had pipped at the wrong end. I let them go for 32 hours after the external pip but chose to intervene when I noticed there was dried and sticky looking stuff around the hole. It went perfect!! Very long process but so worth it. I’m not completely out of the woods yet though; I have eight more to go in a second incubator.
Shall we have a very long backstory? We shall...
So I decided to plunge into the chicken world head first. Me and my kiddos went to pick out six chicks. I decided six was a nice even number to start with. If these went off with a bang I was going to add more the following spring. We returned from our local tractor supply store with six chicks and four ducks. I couldn’t help it. With the ducks and chicks in their brooders, I went to work on the coop. I refused the help of the hubby. I wanted to do this myself.
Fast forward to “adulthood”... chickens are amazing! The love is mutual; they jump into my arms, take naps in my lap... you get the picture. The ducks are much the same. We ended up with three drakes and only one female (that poor, poor female). She started laying eggs like the easter bunny. Sporadically all over the yard. I let her go for nine days to see if she would gather them into a pile. Three days go by with no new eggs. I started walking the wood line in search of a nest, nothing. The next day I let my pooch out like I always do but this morning the ducks flocked out from under the porch. Sure enough, she had a nest built with four eggs nicely tucked in. I gather the nine eggs in the yard and set them up in the house. She wasn’t sitting yet on the other four so I knew if the original nine went much longer, fertility would plummet. So off to the tractor supply for an incubator! Everything was set up properly. Seven days later, I had six wiggly embryos! Three were not viable.
Fast forward a few days... the ducks decided to go visit our neighbor. A bit like “Over the River and Through the Woods” type. Two drakes came back bloody. The other two didn’t come back at all. I was devastated. It was all my fault, I let them free range during the day. They had plenty of room to forage without running out of real estate (so I thought). That night we had our first frost of the season. I was already bummed about my feather babies and now I had the only remaining piece of her sit in frost for hours! My hubby came home that evening with a second incubator to try and cheer me up (love him!). So I thought “What the hell!”. I gathered the eggs and let them set up for a few days, stuck them in the incubator and crossed all my fingers and toes. Guess what? All eight have wiggly little embryos in them!!! We’re currently at day 14 for the second batch.
To wrap this up, we currently have 12 chickens laying, eight embryos squirming, six ducklings peeping, four guineas squawking, two ducks not foraging, and a fur baby living happily!! If you’ve made it this far, thanks for reading!!!
Click to expand...
:welcome :welcome :welcome
 

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