need expert duck advice about my ducks... plz help...

[Kendell]

i have seven ducks two mallords {one male, one female} , two pekin ducks {one male, one female} , three cayuga ducks {one male, two female}... just yesterday one of the female ducks layed one egg, i went and bought a incubator to help with hatching some eggs... my concern was should i of got the egg for incubator or left it alone for the momma duck to take care if the egg??? all day long she never showed interest in the egg so me being first time to get the oppertunit to hatch a egg i thought momma duck would never sit on the egg so i put it in the incubator and researched what all to do for incubation.... i read a post that most ducks will not go sit on any eggs until they have around 12-15 eggs together so now im questioning putting the egg in incubator... exspecially now that i found out ducks will lay one or possibly two eggs every day and with incubation when you put eggs in first day it says your not suppose to mess with for one full day so f im putting new egg in incubator everyday then previous egg would get messed up becuse your suppose to turn it every other hour... so these are my main concerns right now... is it honestly better to hatch eggs if you just leave it up to the ducks to do the job?? or should i just take over and use incubator... its my first time at this and also all my ducks as well... and if im to keep incubating them then how does it work with the whole every day putting a new egg in the incubator??? just any advice and answers to my question would be much appreciated... thank you kendell

 

[Amiga]

I am not a hatcher. People feel differently about incubation versus natural hatching. Both can be dicey.

You would, I think, collect the eggs for a week or so, then put them all in at once. You don't want to get any eggs far ahead of the rest, because there is a time called lock down right at the end, where opening the 'bator can be fatal to the babies in the eggs. The membrane dries and shrink wraps them. sad.

So take a look at the Thread Formerly Known as Hatch Day is Today, and the stickies on hatching (look at the top of the forum page).

 

[HollyDuckFarmer]

My rule for eggs is 30days to incubate after they are laid. I don't remember where I read this, but it works here. I always have a Lady who gets the urge to sit once a good sized clutch gets built up

 

[Kendell]

so your saying 30 days the egg is left alone and nothing after those 30 days you would incubate???

 

[HollyDuckFarmer]

When I decide that I'm going to let one of them sit on her eggs, I will count the day the 1st is laid as Day 1. Then I would allow her to continue laying for up to 30 days before that 1st egg would need to be incubated. Like I said, one of my ducks always sits after 2-2.5 weeks. Always. Now if I was going to artificially incubate, then I'd just allow her to lay and continue laying for 2-3 weeks and then I'd pull them to incubate myself.

Last month I gave away a dozen unwashed eggs for hatching. Those eggs could have been put under a Broody, but the person decided to go the incubator route. Anyway, out of the 12, I think 2 were infertile and 9 did hatch. Personally I never see numbers like that with broody ducks. My largest hatch is 6, I've also had several hatches of 4. And once just 1. So hatching is sort of a crapshoot, IMO.

 

[Kendell]

ok, makes alot of sense... guess im hopeing that mom duck will go broody and lay on her eggs, this is her first time laying eggs so hopeing she will do good with everything... im still going to wait for about 15 eggs see what she does if not laying on them by then, then ill just collect them and incubate them myself... once she has her clutch and starts layig on that clutch of eggs will she continue to daily lay eggs or stop until that clutch shed be laying on hatches????