Muscovy excitement! (and questions)

[mpghm]

wow this sure is taking forever - I spotted a third external pip yesterday with a bigger hole, this morning I saw a beak working in there. Little progress if any in the other eggs.

Six days after the first hatch, and it's not over yet!

One of the remaining eggs has been cheeping loudly for the last day and a half. It's been moved around a bit by both ducks and humans and experienced lots of humidity and temperature changes, so I decided to intervene. Last night I cracked the shell lightly. No progress this morning, but lots of cheeping, so I picked off some of the shell. Last I candled the air cell had stretched along the length of the egg, and it looks like the egg had been rolled so the air cell was facing down. During the morning I picked off a bit now and then and helped a bit with the membrane, and gave it a light spray now and then. By the time the head was free, I had to leave for work. I've turned off the fan, turned down the heat a bit, added another water dish, and I'm hoping it can make it out on it's own without drying.

 

[tmorgan46]

@mpghm status report? How's things going>

 

[mpghm]

All good, 9 birds in the brooder. Approx 65% hatch rate.

 

[tmorgan46]

Howdy @mpghm I started another thread but thought I'd follow up and let you know that last night as we were candling and planning to lock down tonight or tomorrow night we noticed one of the eggs had a few dents from the inside working out! So, we took them all out of the auto-turner and placed them on the incubator floor. This morning I woke up to the little rascal out and doing circles around the remainder of the eggs!! He or she will go into the brooder this afternoon. 10 left in the incubator and yesterday was day 30!!!

 

[rainbowchicks]

???

???

Cupcake still makes a purring noise, but I seen post that said wide based legs are usually male? Im not familiar with muscovies so I wasnt sure if Cupcakes legs are really wide or not?

 

[donkeydew2farms]

Rainbowchicks cup cake is so cute.

 

[rainbowchicks]

Haha thank you!!! Its so loveable!! Im overly curious to if its a male or female!!
I love the little black feathers its got on the crest of its head. When it gets excited, when it gets treats or goes in the bath, it raises its top feathers!

 

[fourkidsandduck]

The only sure way to tell is when they get their wing feathers. Female Muscovies will get them first and the females will be smaller than the males. Hope this helps. Looking at the picture it's clear they are both the same size and both evoloping their wing feathers at the same rate. How old are they? Females will have those wing feathers around 4-5 weeks and males will get them later than that.

 

[rainbowchicks]

I actually thought they were alot older than they are! When I go back through the calander, twhyre only 6 weeks now! It seems like we have had them forever. Cupcake is alot bigger than Khaki, but they are 2 different ducks so... ♡

 

[fourkidsandduck]

If I had to guess based on the age and the size of the wing feathers I would be willing to bet Cupcake is a drake. If he was a duck the wing feathers would be longer than at 6 weeks.

It's funny, my daughter named our drake Jingle Bells thinking he was a duck. Then weeks later we found out she was a drake and the name has stuck

She was devastated. Cupcake might have that same fate!