Will We Have Ducklings on the Farm?

[Beccazon]

45 days? Lock her up she’ll eventually get over her broodiness. That’s way to long to be sitting

Easier said. She disappeared during a dog attack...neighbor across the road. We thought she was gone. 3 days later she showed up. I penned her up with the others as it was roost time. Next morning as always I let them out. She was gone 10 min later. On and off for the next 2 weeks she would show up out of the blue and disappear as quickly for several days until one day I saw where she came from and while I watched her, my son located her nest...nearly. When she headed back, he followed her into a HUGE brush pile as far as he could and darn it all she disappeared exactly to the only spot he could not reach from any direction. We cannot see her nest or reach it. But her behavior is 100% broody. And timing is never right when she is out. She is either too far from us when we notice her or she is out when we are not home. We only see her pop up about once a week and then rarely nearby us. Today I went to grab the big dog kennel and POOF she was gone again in less than 5 minutes

 

[3bird]

I am very excited to see if Martha can hatch her self a baby after all of her work!

So are we! She has been working so hard.

 

[3bird]

I

yuban container was for mama duck so ducklings couldn’t get inside. This is the one I use for ducklings View attachment 2238608

Thanks! So the idea is that Yuban is tall enough (and the hole small enough) that ducklings can't get inside but mom can get her bill in?

 

[Miss Lydia]

Head size for mom since it’s about 3-4 weeks before the ducklings can reach it
my Muscovy mama used the short one too just to dip her bill.

 

[3bird]

As K just reminded me, the egg may have been laid on the 19th (not the 26th as I said earlier today)!

 

[Miss Lydia]

That’s why you don’t see any veins

 

[3bird]

12 July Update: Once again, Martha has moved her relatively large nest to the middle of that wall. So interesting! She did not get up this morning at all, so I could not check the egg.

Today's Question: We're going to secure her space in the duckhouse today probably, and we're trying to decide how to do it. We want her and her duckling to have a safe place with food and water. Do we:

1. Close off the whole duckhouse to the rest of the flock?
2. Partition the duckhouse, so the other girls can come and go to half the duckhouse?
3. Build a sort of enclosure inside the duckhouse door so that the other girls can come up and see what's going on but not have access to half of the duckhouse?

We're kind of leaning toward option #3, in part because it it easier than option #2. We simply need to build a frame in the shop, attach hardware cloth and slide it into place inside the duckhouse (affixed temporarily to the wall). We don't really like option #1 because it feels to us that the sooner the flock meets the duckling the better, but that's just a gut feeling and what we know from our experience of integrating a bird into a flock. Option #2 was the plan, but it severely limits the space for Martha and the duckling, meaning that the food and water need to be closer to the nest. Do you have thoughts? Image below is obviously not to scale!

 

[Miss Lydia]

That number 3 is similar to what I did. It has a gate so they are completely off limits but everyone can see each other. Now that my two ducklings are 7 weeks they still on their own go in there to sleep an I put the gate up an latch it.

 

[3bird]

That number 3 is similar to what I did. It has a gate so they are completely off limits but everyone can see each other. Now that my two ducklings are 7 weeks they still on their own go in there to sleep an I put the gate up an latch it.

That looks good. I'm bummed that I have to work around her as she is sitting. That will certainly stress her out some.

 

[3bird]

Given that today could be Day 24, when do you think it's prudent to lock Martha into her space and provide food and water? Should we wait until she stops coming off the nest? I've heard that a mama duck won't leave the nest at all in the last 24 hours, but I have no idea if that is true. I'd like her to be able to still get a bath and run around for a bit each day as long as that is possible. Thoughts?