Hatching ducklings

[lsm1066]

One of our neighbour's ducks found a nice cozy spot in the gravel next to our garage to sit on her eggs. She's been there for a month and sure enough, yesterday 9 ducklings hatched. She duly took them up to show them off and was therefore penned in for the night so as to keep any predators off the ducklings.

However, there are still 5 eggs left. Since they weren't being turned our kept warm, my soft old husband brought them in and put them in a box under a light. Overnight another one has hatched. But to be honest I haven't seen them newly hatched before so I'm not entirely sure what to expect. The duckling's currently lying down, breathing and drying out. Can anyone give me any pointers? The other 5 eggs aren't showing any signs yet but I guess they still could over the next day or two. I'll let my neighbour know so that he can take any more that hatch and keep them with their mum but otherwise I really haven't a clue.

Thanks
Lynne

[red]

it will need warmth. - shouldn't need anything to eat at first. best thing would be to try and sneak it under the duck and let her look after it.

[lsm1066]

Thanks for that. By the time I got home from work at lunchtime the one that had hatched was doing ok, pretty active but still drying off, and the one that was hatching still hadn't got round to it. The neighbour came round (picked up his guinea pig that one of our cats had killed and didn't bat an eyelid! - "That's nature for you" was his exact response) and said that she'd taken an extra 3 but he wouldn't be able to fool her into any more but that if we wanted to have a go with them, feel free, just don't expect too much as they usually leave the nest when there's nothing more to be done with what's there.

Since my dad has a broody hen who's probably only going to sit for another few days anyway, we took them round to her. She wasn't particularly impressed with the one that had already hatched but she was more than happy to sit on the eggs and got mightily grumpy with my dad when he went in to check on her and put the hatchling back under her!

So now we wait and see. Shouldn't be long, one way or the other.

Lynne

[red]

good luck!

[lsm1066]

They all died. Ah well, such is life. There are still 9 running around having fun.

On to next year then

Lynne