How to make my Cayuga Duck Broody

[AnjKar n Ducks]

Hi,
I have a Cayuga female that I have and I have ducklings coming in on Wednesday from metzer farm!! Because I'll have a male and 2 females. I want to hatch ducklings on my own not to be bought. I've read Cayuga ducks are a broody breed but because I do 4-H I don't think she will not understand. She does spend much time in her house, there is a nesting area. Since I read they are broody I didn't think I would need an incubator she would just sit on them.

 

[sourland]

If you leave the eggs and allow her to build a clutch, she may go broody. You can't 'make' her go broody.

 

[AnjKar n Ducks]

@sourland

Will I have to change the eggs out to keep them from being rotten?
I heard putting golf balls or fake eggs like foam or plastic ones?!

 

[sourland]

Hopefully someone with Cayuga experience will comment. Most of my experience has been with muscovies or mallards which lay a clutch and then go broody. With Rouens or Pekins I just removed eggs daily and stored them in a climate controlled area. You could always date or number the eggs and then remove the oldest if the clutch became too large.

 

[cayugaducklady]

I've never hatched any babies because I don't have any drakes. I have one year old Cayuga hens that spent the whole spring and summer cycling through broodiness. I didn't let any eggs build up in the nest. I removed them daily. I didn't do anything to make them go broody. One day they were normal hens. The very next day they wouldn't leave the nest box and were super duper grouchy/protective. They didn't stop until they started their major molt.

The breed definitely can go broody but I think it's up to the individual hen's biology to determine when/if/how broodiness is expressed. I had to get the daily eggs out of the nest when they weren't around. If they saw me gathering eggs they'd try to get them out of the egg basket. Or if i was caught in the act of gathering eggs they'd go in the nest house and roll them back in the nest and cover them up or sit on them.

You may have some luck enriching her diet to get her in really top physical condition since broodiness means they have the nutrition stores to sit on a nest for hours on end daily.
I don't mean making her fat or force feeding her.