I think my duck is sitting on her nest :)

[Jen1979]

Thank you for the link, I didn't have that one

Yes, that's what I'm worried about with the rats We've had to resort to poisoning them but needed to get some poison that won't travel up the food chain and hurt any of our pets or the wildlife. It's quite difficult here because we have to be very careful where we put traps or bait because we have some endangered small marsupials that like to hang out in our backyard!

 

[Miss Lydia]

Thank you for the link, I didn't have that one

Yes, that's what I'm worried about with the rats

We've had to resort to poisoning them but needed to get some poison that won't travel up the food chain and hurt any of our pets or the wildlife. It's quite difficult here because we have to be very careful where we put traps or bait because we have some endangered small marsupials that like to hang out in our backyard!

That does present a problem, now if my dh was close he'd come over with his 22 and take care of them for you. That's how he use to eliminate them when we lived in Florida.

We use to be able to by a poison that wasn't suppose to be harmful to our pets if they happen to eat it, [hard to believe right a poison not harmful to pets but will kill rats] anyway I haven't seen it in years.

 

[Jen1979]

Hahaha now that would be handy my DH said a few weeks ago it would be helpful if we could just shoot them lol. Not a plan he'll be able to go through with though because you pretty much have to own a large farm to get a gun here (or the application process takes so long that the rats would have all gone and died of old age haha ) Up until a few weeks ago I'd been a bit of a rat saver' I didn't want to hurt them because I used to have some as pets when I was younger. Now it's come down to them upsetting or hurting my ducks.....that's changed things

We have some stuff called Racumen here that we're giving a try. We've put it up on the roof so the bandicoots and kangaroos can't get it. Hopefully it works - I just saw a rat run up the fence in the duck yard this morning :/

 

[Miss Lydia]

Hahaha now that would be handy

my DH said a few weeks ago it would be helpful if we could just shoot them lol. Not a plan he'll be able to go through with though because you pretty much have to own a large farm to get a gun here (or the application process takes so long that the rats would have all gone and died of old age haha

) Up until a few weeks ago I'd been a bit of a rat saver' I didn't want to hurt them because I used to have some as pets when I was younger. Now it's come down to them upsetting or hurting my ducks.....that's changed things

We have some stuff called Racumen here that we're giving a try. We've put it up on the roof so the bandicoots and kangaroos can't get it. Hopefully it works - I just saw a rat run up the fence in the duck yard this morning

They can sure be a nuisance. we have a wood rat here that is so pretty but again they carry disease so we don't want them.They will get your duck eggs too.

 

[Jen1979]

It's day 23 here. All 3 girls are still sitting on the nests they've made (they just keep sharing the eggs because there's so many of them). They haven't had any arguments as yet and we've created a fully secure rat and snake proof shaded pen around the area they chose to nest in without disturbing them (yes, that was a bit of a mission!)

I have tried to candle a few of the eggs (I can only quickly have a look at a few on the rare occasion they all head off for a drink and a swim for about 10 minutes, so I just collect about 6 of them, check them and put them back). But in all honesty I really don't know what I should be seeing anyway!

There's some that look like they either weren't fertilized or never developed (just look like a normal egg), there's some that have tons of veins all through the egg, there's some that are just completely dark red except for the air sack at the bottom). I don't think I can see any movement though. Does that mean:
A) they might not be alive
B) at this stage of the game they're filling most of the shell so I can't see them moving
C) I have no idea what I'm doing

My money is on C. Lol.
Of course, since they kept laying for a few days after they started sitting there's a good chance some are a few days further along than others.

I guess I'll know within a week though! We have an incubator on standby incase after some hatch (if they do) they all abandon the rest. I'm not sure how to be sure which ones are developing or not though.

My main concern is that yesterday the temp here got up to 45 degrees Celsius. Yep, ridiculous The ducks seemed to do ok though, they panted but didn't seem overly stressed. I'm worried though that as they continued sitting on the eggs the high heat might have done the developing ducklings in... Thank goodness the temps are going to be in the low 30'sC for the next week!.

 

[Mutley]

Wow - maybe I should have gotten runners after all! (I have khaki campbells.)
Looking forward to the end of the story. Good luck to your ducks

 

[KWSRetMSgt]

Ok, so I spoke too soon. Not only are 2 of the ducks "sharing" the nest, but the third has joined in!! Doesnt seem to be any arguing yet... Our 3 girls are Princess, Coco and Marshmallow. Princess is the one who first started sitting on the nest, and she's the one who sits on it most of the time. When she gets up to go for a swim or a walk, Coco sits on the nest. Marshmallow showed no interest in the nest at all until last night- I saw her pushing straw over the eggs when both Coco and Princess got up for food. This morning when I went out there, Coco and Marshmallow were sitting on the nest together and Princess was off having a swim with our male, Norris!

I've noticed in the very brief times where I can have a look in the nest when no-one is sitting on it that they are still adding eggs to the nest.... When Princess started sitting on it there were 16 eggs. Now there are 25. Is that normal? Will they just keep laying more and more eggs?? What should I do? I thought about marking all the eggs that are in there now and taking any new ones away, but I'm not sure if that's the right thing to do!

This is what the nest looks like now:

My two original geese did the same thing, they shared a nest. I was told it most likely wouldn't work, so I was thinking the same way you seem to be. I figured because they were so young they wouldn't hatch anything. So I started taking eggs I ended up taking almost twenty eggs from them and put then in the incubator. Out of the twenty, I hatched only five only because all but seven of them turned out to be infertile. And the two that didn't hatch, died very early. Anyway, my girls continued to lay and together sat on another twenty two eggs, out of which thirteen hatched, but three died just days after hatching. So my girls shared their nest and hatched another ten eggs. Needless to say I suddenly went from three geese to having eighteen. I didn't count on that in the first year.

Best of luck hopefully you'll have a whole flock of ducklings running around later this spring.

 

[Jen1979]

Wow - maybe I should have gotten runners after all! (I have khaki campbells.)
Looking forward to the end of the story. Good luck to your ducks

I am really surprised at their dedication. We were told when we got them not to expect them to go broody or if they did, not to expect them to continue to sit on the nest because they are hopeless at it! Seems our 3 didn't get the memo!

My two original geese did the same thing, they shared a nest. I was told it most likely wouldn't work, so I was thinking the same way you seem to be. I figured because they were so young they wouldn't hatch anything. So I started taking eggs I ended up taking almost twenty eggs from them and put then in the incubator. Out of the twenty, I hatched only five only because all but seven of them turned out to be infertile. And the two that didn't hatch, died very early. Anyway, my girls continued to lay and together sat on another twenty two eggs, out of which thirteen hatched, but three died just days after hatching. So my girls shared their nest and hatched another ten eggs. Needless to say I suddenly went from three geese to having eighteen. I didn't count on that in the first year.

Best of luck hopefully you'll have a whole flock of ducklings running around later this spring.

Oh wow! That must have been an unexpected handful!! I'm trying so hard not to get my hopes up too far, just incase none hatch or survive. I'm just setting up the area for them now. I was thinking of having one tall bucket (for the adults to drink out of but the ducklings wont be able to get into), a shallow baking tray for duckling swimming, and a food bowl they can all eat out of with duckling starter.

Will the adults be ok eating duckling starter for a few weeks? Or should I try and get another container only they can get into with their normal food?

There's a chance all 3 girls are going to want to be involved with the ducklings (one is not as committed as the rest and may give up, but I'll have to see). We only have those 3 girls and one boy. Our male sleeps in the secure section with them at night at the moment and calls them out one by one in the day to have a few minutes free range or a swim with him. I'm not sure what to do, I can either:
a) Lock him out from the section the girls are in (which is inside their normal enclosure)
b) Lock him out from that section in the day but let him go in at night
c) Leave the section open during the day, lock up the general enclosure so they can't roam the backyard, and lock everyone in the secure section at night (the section is a fair way off the ground - I could put a ramp up to it so the mamas can take the ducklings down the ramp into the general enclosure).

Maybe I should try and take some photos of the whole area this afternoon so some of that makes some sense to everyone!?


In the meantime, here's a photo of one of the girls sitting on the nest. This is Coco. Princess and Marshmallow had jumped up for a quick drink. She got some rose petals for a snack

 

[KWSRetMSgt]

When my geese were sitting they stayed in the run along with the gander and the eight ducks they grew up with

 

[Jen1979]

When my geese were sitting they stayed in the run along with the gander and the eight ducks they grew up with

Oh great, thanks KWSRetMSgt My drake is a lovely boy, not aggressive or anything so hopefully he's fine in with them then!