When will my Muscovy Duck lay again?

[BC-NZ]

Hello, I'm just new here and new to Duck keeping and so far it's been great fun!

On the 16 December 2013 I got a Muscovy Duck with 7 x 1 week old ducklings. The person I got them from said she's about 1 year old and the ducklings were from her eggs.
1 week ago now we separated the ducklings from mum into a separate run where they can't see each other.

What I'd like to know is when is she likely to start laying again? (it's mid summer here in New Zealand )
Also, she's alone in her run, does she need to have company? if so does it need to be a Drake to encourage her to lay or would any Duck be ok as I'm quite keen to get another breed of Duck more suited for egg laying?
If it can be any, what would be a good egg laying breed to put with her?

All tips and suggestions will be most appreciated as we jumped into this from the deep end (fell in love with this sweet little family and then started researching into Ducks....)

Many thanks in advance

 

[HEChicken]

Mine started laying in late-winter, laid a clutch (despite the fact I was collecting them every day, they still seemed to "know" when they had laid enough to constitute a clutch) and then went broody. After sitting on eggs for 5 weeks and raising ducklings for another 3-5 weeks, some of them started to lay again but one didn't. The ones who laid, laid another clutch and brooded again. By that time it was probably mid-summer. Following the second hatch of ducklings none of them laid again. I keep them around because they have fun personalities and don't quack like other ducks - and the males grow to a large size for eating, fairly quickly. But good layers they are not!

 

[BC-NZ]

Thanks HEChicken, yes the ducklings will end up on our table (apart from maybe 1 or 2) which brings up another question, I'm feeding them a chicken grower feed along with fresh greens but as this is my first time I don't know how well they're progressing weight wise. Should I be feeding them something extra to help pack it on?

 

[HEChicken]

In my experience they do quite well packing it on without anything extra. That is all mine get too - chicken grower. For the first month or so, they barely seem to change - they still have baby down and don't seem to grow much. Then, all of a sudden, they go through a growth spurt. One day you turn around and there is a huge duck there and you wonder where he came from and then realize he was a cute little duckling just yesterday

 

[BC-NZ]

Just a few weeks ago 3 would swim together in a Cat litter try, now one of the boys almost fills it!
What age do you process - they're now 6 1/2 - 7 weeks old and I noticed the Ducklets are just beginning to grow wing feathers, all have tail and breast feathers and some have feathers on their heads
Thanks again

 

[HEChicken]

They will keep growing slowly for several months but I've found that by about 14 weeks they're a decent size, and after that, growth slows down, so while they will get bigger after that, the feed-meat conversion isn't as good as in that first 14 weeks.

 

[BC-NZ]

Got our fist egg last Friday and one each day since (total of 4 now) first 2 she laid in the duck house and the next 2 she waited till being let out and then laid them in the grass clippings on our compost pile....!
I think she maybe doesn't get enough peace in the duck house to lay there, the nest she made in there keeps getting trampled on and filled in, there's 3 nesting boxes in there as well but she doesn't seem to want to go into them