Mallard duck questions

[YaksChicks]

Hey yall. I have a Drake and her that are basically pets. I noticed today that my Drake is starting to attempt to mate w the her. We got them in late April at 4 weeks old. What can I expect egg wise? Will she hatch all of them? Where will she lay? I have no clue and all the research I do doesn't really help. We are in Louisiana so there's no real winter here. Lol. Any help would be appreciated!

 

[Twistedfeather]

Keep in mind that a Mallard Duck may or may not hatch her own eggs and you might need to step in and use an incubator. When my family raised Mallards she went broody luckily and hatched five at least. Before you get too excited test one of the eggs when you get them to see if they are fertile. Inbreeding can be a more dangerous tool in ducks then in chickens. But if it's working then go for it what's the worst that can happen?

 

[YaksChicks]

What do u mean by test one? She's not even laying anything right now. But today I saw my Drake actually mount her

 

[Twistedfeather]

Wait for her to lay an egg. Just because he's mounting her doesn't mean she'll lay eggs just yet. But this means with the mounting that the Drake is entering sexual maturity. Your Duck on the other hand may not be ready just yet. Testing an egg means breaking one open to see if you can see any signs of fertility. Normally when you do this you are the one hatching them through an incubator and you see some problems when you candle them

 

[hollys]

Uh oh. We have pekin ducks and just put the eggs in the incubator. Should we have checked one first? I don't even think I would know what to look for.

 

[Twistedfeather]

Wait a little bit eggs don't start to develop until day five or seven. Candling is also something you might want to try. Go into a dark room and use a really strong flashlight to see if can see something. Dark embryo's normally means something went wrong. If you can find this book:




It's by Gail Damerow and it's really good on telling you what to do if your doing it for the first time.

 

[hollys]

Thanks for all the help! Fingers crossed