Is it possible to incubate duck and chickens together? We ended up with a couple duck eggs in our batch. Do we need to get another incubator for our duck eggs?
It should work out OK. The duck eggs will hatch a week (or 2 weeks if they are Muscovy) after the chicken eggs. The elevated humidity for hatching the chicks shouldn't have any ill effect on the duck eggs. If the chicks start jostling the duck eggs around just figure that they are doing the turning that you can't during lockdown.
I have never incubated duck eggs and only now have my first batch of chicken eggs in the bator. But, duck eggs require different temps and humidity than chicken eggs. According to my book, temp for duck eggs should be 101.5, 102, 102.5, 103 for each consecutive week (in still air) and 99.25-99.75 for forced air. Humidity varies a lot depending on incubator, treatment of eggs etc but range is 55-65% and 75% during hatch. Eggs should be cooled once daily for different lengths depending on week. Again, I haven't incubated duck eggs, I let my girls do that. But I have heard alot about it and they are supposed to be more difficult than chicken eggs.
