I am a year into raising ducks. We had ours a year ago as day olds. One of the females has been terribly broody for quite some time and gave up on a few of her prior nests after sitting on them for over a month. About a month ago she had about 17 eggs in her nest, and I candled them at about 2 weeks and tossed a few bad ones, but left the remaining developing eggs in her nest. She went back to sitting on them. The a few days later, I went to check them again and she darted at me as if she was going to bite me and would hiss (she never got like this with any of her other nests. She would always let me candle them).2 days later after this near duck biting incident we noticed she started a new nest just a foot away from the old one with 3 eggs in it that we could visibly see. I am unsure if in 2 days she laid 3 new eggs, or moved 3 from the old nest to the new nest. Anyways, she wouldn't get off that nest and every time we went to bring her food and water she would hiss and us and not move off the nest. The new nest has been there for about a week and in the past few days she doesn't sit ON the nest, but RIGHT next to it and if we get near her, she will stand on the EDGE of the nest and hover over it hissing sometimes and uses her beak to "adjust" the straw on the nest like she is covering the eggs a little, but she won't stand on or sit on the eggs. Just hovers over them to cover them from us. Is there a chance that maybe she moved her eggs to that nest and they are now hatching and she doesn't want us to see? It's odd she won't sit on them now and the original nest eggs would be about 4 weeks old now (and if they are 3 new eggs...then they would only bee a week and a half old). Anyone know why she is acting like this? I won't go in my her near her nest now...I just reach my arm close enough to give her fresh food and water as to not stress her out. And when she does get defensive and hisses, her boyfriend runs right along to make sure the situation is ok. Any help would be appreciated!
