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Shanaywe

Shanaywe

In the Brooder
5 Years
Sep 24, 2014
19
0
22
Kansas
Hi! I am 17 years old and I love ducks
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! I decided to incubate some! My little babies are due oct. 12!!! I'm so excited, although I am a candling addict. I'm wondering how often I should candle my eggs? I just finished and they are moving all around! Makes me so excited!
 
Please hold off on the candling. Every time you open the incubator, the heat and humidity drop. Plus it's easy to drop eggs and you don't want that to happen. If your eggs are on lockdown, you shouldn't touch them at all. If the humidity drops too low you will have 'shrink wrapped' chicks that cannot get out of the shell.
 
Okay! Thank you for the tips! I will defiantly not candle near as much! At what point of the incubation process do I put them on lockdown?
 
Hello there and welcome to BYC!
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How egg-citing!! Yes, you only need to candle occasionally. I usually do a candling, (and this is with chicken eggs, I have never hatched duck eggs) sometime around day 10 and pitch the eggs that are not showing signs of growth. Duck eggs may require more time than day 10 to show signs of life. But then I don't candle until lock down when I am moving eggs anyway. Other than this, I don't do more candling. I just let them be on their own.

Definitely stop by our ducks section to talk to our duck experts. Good luck with the hatch and keep us posted!! :)
 
Thank you so much I defiantly will!! One more chicken question before I head over to the duck section.. Our mother hens feathers are off on their backs.. Is this because of the rooster? Do we clip him? Or get rid of him? What do we do?
 
Yes, roosters can cause lots of damage to the hens feathers on the backs and usually this is from over mating. So you need to add more hens to your flock. If the hens get too bald on the back, they can be injured badly. So I would separate this rooster for a while to let the hens repair. The proper ratio is 1 roo to 8 to 10 hens. If your roo is favoring one hen, he should be kept away from her for a while. Rooster can do great damage to hens.

They also make a thing called a hen saddle to protect the backs of the hens....http://www.hensaver.com

If you are not interested in fertile eggs, there is no need for a rooster. The hens will lay just as well and be more happy without a rooster bothering them all day long.

Good luck with your flock!
 
Welcome to BYC! Please make yourself at home and we are here to help.
Congrats on the eggs!
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Saddles are used for hens who are getting frequent attention from roosters. Usually during breeding, a rooster will claw a hen’s back, resulting in feather loss. The poor hen will then sometimes begin to bleed and get pecked by other birds. A chicken saddle will protect the hen’s back from potential pecking, further feather loss and even help the feathers grow back. Defiantly check out the link provided by Two Crows.

Chicken saddles sure help a lot!

BEFORE

DURING

AFTER
 
Thank you all so very much for all your great advice! This has helped so so much! Can't wait for my babies to hatch and hens to recover! I will keep yall updated on their progress
 

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