my ducks have fertile eggs

[Just Hatch duck]

hello,
i have two ducks and just got a male thats already breed with my females and they have laid fertile eggs but I'm not sure if i just take the eggs and put them in an incubator until they hatch or just leave them with the mother but I'm worried with leaving them with the mother because i have five chickens and another duck and I'm not sure if the farther will harm the ducklings
so what should i do

 

[birdmanmax]

Your best bet is to put the eggs in the incubator. You don't know how good of a mother she will be or even if she will go broody and stay broody. And once they hatch you don't know what the other birds will do or where the babies might get stuck or trapped.yes it's very cute to see the duckling follow their mother but it's a lot safer and better for the ducklings to be hatched out of an incubator. You will not have to worry nearly as much when they are in the incubator. And don't have to worry about drowning or feed problems.

 

[Just Hatch duck]

thank you for your response ill put them in an incubator just t be safe i don't want to risk it

 

[purslanegarden]

Anything larger is always a threat to baby birds. Even if they're not pecking at them to eat them, they might just be curious. But then that peck hits the baby in a wrong way, or the baby just got tired of it all, and once he starts showing signs of weakness, all the other birds, including other babies it hatched with, start picking on it.

I would say that once you have some eggs in the incubator so that you can make sure to continue the flock that you have, you can let her sit on the next batch, and find out how she will be as a mother.