The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Livestock => Poultry & Waterfowl => Topic started by: Lavinia on January 13, 2010, 06:34:11 pm
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For those who haven't heard me go on and on about my wonderful joint present for my Birthday / Christmas from my wonderful son. I received a incubator and 18 duck eggs. On first candling at 10 days 3 where infertile, at second candling i found another that i wasn't sure about the first time around. 14 eggs due to hatch tomorrow, and as its my first time I'm excited, scared etc etc... OH Joe and i have had a look this morning and there where 3 with external pipping, there is now 10 at our last check. These are the ones on the two outside rows we can't get a great look at the 4 in the middle as there are below the hood/heater that runs the incubator. How long will it take, should i have them tomorrow or will it go on to the end of the week. Any advice would be great......... got the brooder set up and ready. The instructions that have came with the incubator says that once they start hatching that i should only open it every 6 hours???
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i think it stops the humidity, thats built up from escaping and stops hatching the other eggs.theyl be fine for a good few hours .does it have a viewing window?i left mine in overnight to dry out properly.theyre still digesting yolk,thats how they can post them!
exciting though isnt it.?
well done .
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omg soooo excited 1 is half way out... going to have to take some photo's. I have had a house full this evening, couldn't wait to get them all away as now i can just sit and watch it's so amazing. It does have a window, so loads of viewing........ soooo excited, whoops already said that..
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Wow that sounds amazing keep us posted!!!!!! :&> :&> :&> :&>
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I'm keeping all fingers crossed that all goes well. Shame James is in thailand, he could give on the spot support otherwise.
Am I right that you are in Fife, Lavinia? Keep us posted on the new lives! :&> :&>
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We now have 8 and some still with cracks in them, we got one late last night, 1 this morning and then the rest this afternoon.... i have taken pictures so will get around to uploading them when they are all finished hatching... I live in Midlothian, James had given me some advice about the set up of the incubator before he went away.. Bad timing for me i guess.........
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Huge update we now have 11 ducklings, the 3 eggs that are still in the incubator have no cracks, What do you all think, how long should i give them?????
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Hi Lavinia
normal hatching for ducks is 28 days as you know but can sometimes extend a few days longer - how long have they been in there now?
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Well done Lavinia, this is great news. A few times I have had the ducks start to hatch from 25 days. The waiting game is the worst, however, if you think one in prticular is strugeling get in there and help it. I have also had them start to come out a day or 2 after the 28 ays but generally they are all out around the same time. Enjoy the experience, it is amazing. :)
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James does this mean that you are back in snowy Scotland........ We have candled again the eggs that were left and i decided to stop the incubator, we did open the eggs to check and they had died sometime in the last week, (they smelled awful) but were fully developed. Maybe they just didn't have the strength to get out??? So out of the 15 that were fertile we have managed to get 11 this far so i am pleased as it was my first go... Itching to have another go already.... lol I'm an addict
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I'm getting all jealous and broody... can't wait for photos, Lavinia! what kind of ducks are they ? :&> :&> :&> :&> :&> :&>
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They are khaki campbells, hope to have the photos uploaded today, they are doing so well, can't believe that they just started eating and drinking all by themselves, how clever is mother nature......
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Lavinia I am still sitting here, basking in 33 degree's heat I am pleased to say. Still have over a week left which is a great feeling. Looking forard to pictures of your new additions, that was a great success rate for your first attempt. Trouble is the incubator can become addicitve!
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33 degrees - James i was beginning to like you... lol.. i'm very pleased with the 11. After putting the water in at the beginning i was afraid that i would get none.. It is very addictive was looking at some white campbell eggs next....
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I have always wanted to hatch eggs but I wouldn't know what to do with the chicks - how do you go about selling them? I would like more hens as due to various events I'm down to 8 - all ex-batts except one LS, but there again I couldn't kill any cockerels I got as a result, and one is enough ;)
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Lavinia, congratulations! Didnt realise how fast its come round that you'd be hatching already! (well, not you, but you know what I mean!)
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Hi Annie
I have always loved ducks and really fancied a flock of my own as we have to buy our duck eggs. We got some baby chicks earlier in the year and we ended up with 3 cockerels in them. We are fatting 2 for the pot, don't know how to go about selling them but you could put notices in the market place or on a local web site.....
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As you know from what we posted in previous years, it is a dilemma! If you incubate or even let the birds get on with it you will eventually get too many boys. We tried to ignore it for a few weeks but decisions had to be made! so for this year I decided to get a humane dispatcher, just because I don't want to be in the podsition again where I have to ask people to do it for me! I don't know if I'll be able to use it myself but it's one step closer to dealing with it...
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I have always wanted to hatch eggs but I wouldn't know what to do with the chicks - how do you go about selling them? I would like more hens as due to various events I'm down to 8 - all ex-batts except one LS, but there again I couldn't kill any cockerels I got as a result, and one is enough ;)
Annie you are more than welcome to borrow my incubator if you want a go. The problem is, as you said, if you end up with too many cockerels! I am hoping that my chooks go broody at some point this year. Out here in Thailand most of the houses have hens running around the place and they run amongst many cats and dogs with no problems that I can see. The funniest thing is though the cockerels make a different sound to ours, weird.