A tale of two duck nests... and the ducklings that followed

A couple of months ago, Gwen went broody and started sitting on a nest she had carefully concealed in the coop. She dutifully sat day in and day out on the nest and spent her time rotating her eggs and building up her nest until it was roughly the size that would comfortable house an eagle. And it didn't just stay in one place, no, that would be too simple. So every few days she would move the entire nest and all the eggs inside it to somewhere else in the coop. To say she was industrious would be understating it. On the few occasions when she did leave the nest, to get something to eat or drink or just run around the yard for a few minutes, she would carefully cover the nest back up with straw, and often threw some over her shoulder for good measure on her way out the door. 

About halfway through with her nesting I noticed that there appeared to be two nests in the coop and some of the eggs had migrated into the new nest. Not wanting the eggs to get too cold, I put them back into the bigger nest and then left the coop alone so that Gwen could nest in peace when she got finished with her free time. And yet, each time I was able to check the coop the eggs would be divided up again. It seemed that one of our other females, Gemma, had decided that going broody was apparently the "in" thing to do so she joined Gwen in the coop. 

Now there were two nests that migrated around the coop, making a kind of circuit, going from the back right corner to the center right to the front, moving from right to left, to the center left side. They were in the process of moving into the back left corner of the coop when I noticed, during one of their brief breaks from the nest, that one of the eggs had pipped but was slightly crushed and bleeding in places from the shell. I decided at that point that one of the mothers - probably Gemma as this was her first experience going broody and she is heavier than Gwen - had likely stepped on the shell and the duckling inside was going to need help. I removed the egg from the nest and gave some slight assistance in helping the duckling to hatch enough to be able to breathe and get out on their own. Adina, as I named her, hatched with the yolk still attached by the umbilical cord so I left her alone, keeping her warm and letting her rest while I hoped the cord would take care of itself in a matter of hours or days. She survived that way for a few days but passed away on the third day. 

Gwen and Gemma on their nests

Gwen with little Gracie, the day I found her

A few days later, Gracie hatched - strong and healthy and peeping away in the coop one morning. I decided to let her stay with her mom and see if Gwen could manage to raise a duckling. When I went out a day or two later to shoo Savannah (our poor little battered hen that Lilly loves to pick on) off the deck I noticed a little yellow speck on the patio. Gwen had, apparently, decided it was ok to let Gracie wander the patio by herself, surrounded by chickens and other adult ducks and a whole lot of yard to get lost in. Nope. Not happening. I set up the brooder in the house and popped her in it.

Gracie

Harley

Olive

Harley hatched next, and then Olive. Little Zaida hatched fourth, with the umbilical cord still attached and I didn't think she was going to make it, as she kept trying to push the shell away from her while it was still attached. I left her in the brooder, separated from the rest of the ducklings, and went to sleep. I was amazed to find her alive in the morning, and no longer with the umbilical cord attached. And after finding several more ducklings that had died in the coop, pipped too early or pushed out of the nest while hatching, I decided to set up the incubator for the last viable egg in the coop. It had started to pip so I didn't do any turning, but left it alone in the incubator and found it totally hatched a couple of mornings later. Abigail appears to be the last of the ducklings. 

Zaida, our miracle baby

They are all in the brooder in the house now, and doing well. They love water, and kale and watermelon for treats. At the moment, they are all different sizes and each has slightly different markings but I don't know how long that will last for. We still aren't sure if Gemma is a mallard or a rouen duck but we do know that Gwen is a magpie. Fern, our older male, is an ancona duck and Rosie is our younger male and a magpie/ancona cross. So the ducklings are some mixture of magpie/ancona or mallard-rouen/magpie/ancona breeds. Gracie is for sure a magpie mix, and I suspect Harley is as well... Olive is less certain, and Zaida and Abigail could have some mallard-rouen in their heritage. All of our birds are given girls names, in the hopes that they will turn out to be females. That's how we ended up with drakes named Fern and Rosie, and roosters named Lilly and Gretchen. 

To say that my parents are thrilled with this duckling development would be a lie. They are, in fact, much dismayed to find that we have five new ducklings. I'd like to point out, however, that it could be worse: all 14 of the eggs in the nest could have survived and hatched. Let's count our blessings. 

Abigail

 

Arrivals and departures on the Unfarm, duck edition

I've put it off for almost a year now but I am finally making myself do it. I have to announce the departure of Maggie, one of my favorite ducks. He (named when we thought he was a she) was a beautiful solid white Pekin (you know, like the Aflac duck) that was especially devoted to his mate, Minna. He would bravely defend her from mating attempts by Gretchen and stood up to any hens that decided to chase Minna. He traveled with us to the beach, to our family house on the Puget Sound, and on camping trips where he and Minna were always a big hit with everyone. He lived most of his life (at night) inside the house with Minna and the bunnies in my art studio, locally known as "the bunny room," where he tolerated wearing a diaper quite well and was generally a very loyal, calm, and friendly duck. 

Unfortunately, a short time after moving outside into the duck house, I went out in the morning to let him and Minna out for the day and found that Maggie had passed away sometime in the night. I took his body in to the nearby humane society and had him cremated, and his ashes now sit on one of my bookshelves in my room, along side several other cremated pets. At some point I fear my deceased pets will outnumber my books - and I have a lot of books - but that is the hazard when you live with animals: you are almost guaranteed to outlive them. Sadly. 

At any rate, Maggie's sudden and unexpected departure left Minna alone in the yard and ducks are not designed to be solitary creatures. Also unfortunate was the timing of Maggie's passing. Duckling season was over and procuring new ducks in the middle of July was going to be more troublesome than I would have liked - I usually just get my ducks and chicks from the local feed store about a mile up the road. As it was I had to scour craigslist and got lucky when I found someone in the city who had just hatched a batch of Ancona ducks. 

Fortunately for me, my mom was visiting my sister in Colorado and my dad was on a cross country bicycle trip so it was the perfect opportunity to get two ducklings (as ducklings should always have at least one other duckling with them.) I find it's generally better to ask forgiveness than permission in situations involving the procurement of more pets. This then is how we ended up with Fern and Aida - two beautiful dark brown and white ducks who turned out to both be males. I would have preferred to have ended up with at least one female duck out of the two so that the girls outnumbered the boys but at the very least Minna is no longer the only duck in the yard and could spend her time with the boys if she chooses to (which she does, on occasion) and there are now three ducks to huddle together in the winter time in the duck house at night to keep each other warmer as the duck house lack central heating. 

As beautiful as Fern and Aida are, I don't know as though I would go the route of a private breeder again for acquiring ducks as the boys are much more nervous and flighty than any ducks I have ever gotten from the feed store. I think it may have something to do with how much handling the ducklings got initially, the feed store ducks being exposed to almost constant attention whereas the small breeder ducks didn't receive as much attention in their formative days. That's my theory, anyway.

Maggie and Minna

Aida, with the darker head is on the left and Fern with the lighter head is on the right. They are both quacking their displeasure at my presence in the yard.