substituting chicken eggs and taking my Pekin's eggs to hatch

[chickens really]

@RavynFallen

 

[chickens really]

@Miss Lydia


She is not a hatcher but has great contacts to help you...

 

[Miss Lydia]

@bernie131 It is sweet of you to be so concerned about this Pekin. But let me ask you this what will you do with the ducklings if they hatch? will you take them down to that pond and let them go? because that is really illegal AND will most likely be a death sentence for them. It's called dumping and most likely the way the gander and duck ended up there to begin with. Very sad.

If she was to go broody do you think what ever is getting her eggs will leave her alone if she is sitting on them? most likely she will be killed and eaten and her eggs.

I know you care about this Pekin but think this through unless you can commit to caring for these ducklings your trying to hatch. Your just better off letting nature take it's course and letting the eggs just be taken and eaten. She is a sitting duck just laying an egg out in the open.
When the gander died we all encouraged you to try and find a safe home for the Pekin to me that would be better than trying to hatch her eggs and adding to the dumping problem unless you plan on keeping them all.

 

[bernie131]

I was hoping that she would sit on these last ones that she is laying and I can hatch her others here and hopefully she will know they are hers,..if not I have 2 acres fenced in and raised 22 house rabbits so I know an 'exotic" vet really well,..Shorty and her drake could live here but I do not have a pond,..would she miss that and be unhappy?,..also I know someone dumped her there but Mama took care of her and there are about 12 Mallards that swim there and 6-8 pairs of Canadian geese,... so not knowing her history,..???? She has been there for the 6 plus years that I have been going there,.... The college is VERY active with people walking and running and the dogs have to be on a lease and if anyone approaches her but me,..she swims to the middle on the pond,..it is a very big pond,..so I am at your mercy on what to do,..??

 

[Miss Lydia]

I was hoping that she would sit on these last ones that she is laying and I can hatch her others here and hopefully she will know they are hers,..if not I have 2 acres fenced in and raised 22 house rabbits so I know an 'exotic" vet really well,..Shorty and her drake could live here but I do not have a pond,..would she miss that and be unhappy?,..also I know someone dumped her there but Mama took care of her and there are about 12 Mallards that swim there and 6-8 pairs of Canadian geese,... so not knowing her history,..???? She has been there for the 6 plus years that I have been going there,.... The college is VERY active with people walking and running and the dogs have to be on a lease and if anyone approaches her but me,..she swims to the middle on the pond,..it is a very big pond,..so I am at your mercy on what to do,..??

Not many of us have a pond we mostly use those plastic kiddy pools and I can say for my own ducks and geese they love their pools. They are safe too which Shorty isn't that safe. She may have made it for 6 yrs but wouldn't you feel better knowing she was really safe by giving her a forever home? I'd forget about these eggs this year. Take her and her mate but if her mate is a wild Mallard that is against the law, wait till next season have her set up with secure house and find her a domestic drake to be her mate then see if she'll brood her eggs. If you want ducklings. [Mallards only pair up in spring for mating season then they move on till next year and pair up with another so she really isn't hooked up with this drake he'll find another mate in a wild Mallard eventually.

 

[bernie131]

So I need to find a Pekin drake but what if she doesn't like him?

 

[bernie131]

My avatar is her laying her egg in the morning in her nest that is at the pond will she accept the ducklings if I hatch most of them and will the eggs be fertile from a Mallard drake?

 

[Miss Lydia]

She won't accept the ducklings because imprinting starts at hatch. The ducklings will imprint on what ever they see first. actually before hatch because mama ducks talk to their eggs. All ducks except Muscovy's come from the Mallard so yes she could have fertile eggs.

 

[Miss Lydia]

So I need to find a Pekin drake but what if she doesn't like him?

She'll accept a drake sooner that later. Ducks have been going about pairing up mating and hatching alot longer than we have been doing it for them.Domestic ducks don't necessarily pair up either a domestic drake really needs about 3-4 females to keep him from over mating any one duck. My Muscovy drake has 4 females my Runner has 7.

Mallards are one of the worst for over breeding and actually gang raping other mallard females and drowning them.

 

[bernie131]

So what if I bring her here and let her brood of the last week on the eggs that I have right now in the incubator,..will that work?