PancakesMom
In the Brooder
- Jan 13, 2022
- 2
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New to this community! I have a 10 month old Muscovy named Pancake who is on her first egg laying/ broody cycle. We have a lot of Muscovys in the area and we found Pancake as an abandoned hatchling and could not bear to leave her behind so we took her in. She is mainly an indoor bird but we do have a large yard where she free ranges for several hours a day before coming back inside at night. She began laying eggs about six weeks ago and we were taking them away each day, thinking she would eventually stop laying on her own. After researching more on egg laying habits (this is my first experience with this process so I am learning on the “fly”), I learned that she could continue to lay year round if we let her but we do not want this for her as it seems to take a lot out of her.
I read (here on BYC) that the best way to have her stop laying is to let her go full broody. Her eggs should be unfertilized as we do our best to keep her away from wild drakes, but it is tough to be certain since some wander into our yard occasionally. We do not want her to hatch any ducklings so we have continued to take her eggs but have began replacing them with store bought chicken eggs so she has something to sit on. After 6 replacement eggs she has finally stopped laying (we are on day 4 of no new eggs after laying 1 egg a day for 42 days) and she has gone full broody. She sits on her chicken eggs most of the day and only comes out of her nest once or twice to poop, preen, and have a snack before going right back to sitting.
My question is, how long should I allow her to sit on these chicken eggs before clearing out the nest in order to break her broodiness, but ensure that she does not start laying more eggs until her next cycle? Is 4 days of no eggs long enough to determine that she is done for now? Any advice is welcome since this is all new to me and I want to make sure I am giving her the best care possible but also want my sweet cuddly bird back. We appreciate her eggs as they are quite delicious but I do not want her laying all year. She is part of the family to us, not an egg factory and I would like her to go back to normal for a while and know how to stop the egg laying for future cycles.
Thank you!
I read (here on BYC) that the best way to have her stop laying is to let her go full broody. Her eggs should be unfertilized as we do our best to keep her away from wild drakes, but it is tough to be certain since some wander into our yard occasionally. We do not want her to hatch any ducklings so we have continued to take her eggs but have began replacing them with store bought chicken eggs so she has something to sit on. After 6 replacement eggs she has finally stopped laying (we are on day 4 of no new eggs after laying 1 egg a day for 42 days) and she has gone full broody. She sits on her chicken eggs most of the day and only comes out of her nest once or twice to poop, preen, and have a snack before going right back to sitting.
My question is, how long should I allow her to sit on these chicken eggs before clearing out the nest in order to break her broodiness, but ensure that she does not start laying more eggs until her next cycle? Is 4 days of no eggs long enough to determine that she is done for now? Any advice is welcome since this is all new to me and I want to make sure I am giving her the best care possible but also want my sweet cuddly bird back. We appreciate her eggs as they are quite delicious but I do not want her laying all year. She is part of the family to us, not an egg factory and I would like her to go back to normal for a while and know how to stop the egg laying for future cycles.
Thank you!
Glad you joined.
