LAYING AND SITTING
We now come to the time when the ducks, having paired, show an
inclination to look for suitable nesting places. The drake takes the
lead in this, and you may be sure that when you see birds peering about
in hedge bottoms, stick heaps, &c., that eggs will soon be laid.
At this time, too, they use a different note, and to quote a very apt
term used by a friend of mine, they "begin to talk." About the beginning
of February it is advisable to hint to the ducks where you want them to
lay. If you have any large trees in your paddock, place a number of
sticks up against the trees in the form of a circle, leaving one or two
clear spaces inside the heap. Then make some circular holes, one in each
of the spaces, and about five or six inches deep, and shelving gradually
from rim to centre. It is best to scatter some sand in these holes, so
that the birds can more easily work the nests to the dimensions that
suit them. Don't make the nests too small or too shallow, as they may
have to contain fourteen or fifteen eggs. It is advisable to put some
short dry grass or old hay near the nest, and a very little in it, so
that the duck can manipulate it at her pleasure.
The principal thing to remember is, that the nest must be sheltered as
much as possible from draughts, and be made well in the middle of the
cover, as ducks like darkness when they are sitting. Broom is about the
best cover you can use for sheltering a nest, and is most adaptable.
Practical experience, and one's early failures, teach one more than
anything else how a nest should be made, and yet often when you are
satisfied that you have selected a most suitable spot for nesting
purposes, you will find a duck occasionally preferring a miserably
draughty position for her nest within a yard of the snug retreat you
have devised for her. The only thing then to be done is to leave her
alone until she has settled down to lay steadily, when you can
gradually introduce pieces of broom, &c., so as to shelter her nest as
much as possible from wind and rain, taking care to leave the entrance
to the nest clear. Young ducks as a rule are the most shy, and you will
generally find the older birds only too glad to avail themselves of the
well-sheltered nests that you have provided for them.
Nothing can be better for ducks to nest in than the corners of an
outhouse or old stable, always provided that you have killed off the
rats.
In such places wind and rain can do no harm, and practically every egg
hatches out.
The roots of hollow willow trees are favourite nesting places, but a bit
dangerous if too near the water's edge. Many birds delight in straw
stacks, and if disturbed will simply go up higher, so as to be out of
the way of cattle or human beings.
I believe that if you can get your birds to nest in outhouses or stacks,
you will get a much better hatch out than elsewhere. Last year one of my
ducks took off all her sixteen eggs safely from the corner of a stable,
and a bird sitting close to her hatched eleven, without a single bad
egg; and we had almost as good results from birds nesting in stacks.
One bird, after being disturbed from her nest in the side of a stack,
built at the top, and quite twenty feet from the ground. One fine
morning we found her with fourteen young ducklings, and she appeared
much annoyed at the assistance which we gave to the family to descend.
If the weather is dry and your nests are well situated, your birds
nesting outside may do as well as those described above; but given a
week of cold wind and penetrating wet, down goes your average at once.
Last season was a particularly favourable one, and from the first five
nests (all sat upon by ducks) no less than sixty-five ducklings hatched
out--a highest possible. Naturally this extraordinary percentage was not
maintained. We will now suppose that the ducks have begun to lay, an
event which may take place any time from the middle of February to the
middle of March, after which date they ought to be laying steadily. As
they will lay many more eggs than they can successfully hatch, pick up
some eggs at intervals from the nests, taking care always to leave two
or three in each nest. These eggs should be placed on a large tray or
shallow box, lined with hay, sawdust, or other suitable material. It is
not advisable to place them touching each other, and care should be
taken to turn them daily; if this is done the eggs will keep well for
three weeks, by which time you have collected a sufficient number to put
under hens, however small your stock may be.
Eggs left in the nest will, of course, not require turning, as the duck
does this herself.
When you have collected a number of eggs, place them under hens, having
first satisfied yourself that the hens are good sitters. Eight to ten
sittings of twelve eggs each is a good number to put down as a start, as
from this number you ought to get about a hundred ducklings, and these,
when old enough, can be divided into two runs of about fifty each. I
have found by experience that it is unwise to put a larger number than
this together until the birds are about six or seven weeks old.
Naturally, the number of eggs you can put down will depend on the size
of your stock and the number of sitting hens at your disposal.
A certain amount of care is necessary in preparing the nest for the
hens, as ducks' eggs are very fragile, and much more easily broken than
hens' eggs.
The following is the method which I recommend. Get any square box of
sufficient depth, and having cut some pieces of sod, build up the
corners of the box with them: then cut a square sod to fit the size of
the box, and having removed some of the earth underneath the centre of
the sod, place it grass upwards in the box. By this means you will
obtain the proper shape for the nest, viz., a gradual slope down from
the sides to the centre; this will prevent your hens accidentally
kicking eggs from under them, as owing to the shape of the nest any eggs
which are displaced must roll towards the centre or lowest part of the
nest; there is consequently little danger of any of the eggs getting
cold. After this, line the nest with dry moss. The sod underneath has
the advantage of producing greater heat, and gives a more satisfactory
hatch out than nests made of other material, and being firm does not
lose its shape.
Don't forget to give your sitting hen some ventilation, but be careful
that _no draught can reach the eggs_.
The sitting hens will, of course, be taken off to feed regularly every
day, and you will find them give you less trouble if you take care to
tether them on the same leg each day.
And now to return to the laying ducks.
As time goes on you must leave more eggs in the nest, as the birds will
soon want to sit. A duck shows signs of this by lining her nest with
down from her breast, and in a short time you will find the whole nest,
sides and bottom, lined with a thick covering of down; while the eggs
are covered by what I can best describe as a thick movable quilt, which
protects them from the cold, and the prying eyes of carrion crows and
other poachers.
At this time you will observe the old duck staying longer and longer on
her nest each day as she lays the last egg or two, and you may be sure
that she has fairly begun to sit if you find her still on her nest about
6 or 7 P.M. A day or two before she begins to sit, her nest should be
made up to its proper complement of eggs, and it is always wise to keep
a few eggs in hand for such contingencies. The number of eggs a duck can
sit on depends largely on the size of the duck and also the depth and
breadth of the nest; given favourable conditions a duck can manage
sixteen or seventeen eggs, and I knew of one nest, consisting of sixteen
eggs, all of which hatched off. There is, however, this risk, that
should bad weather come it is practically impossible for a duck to
successfully brood so large a number as sixteen ducklings, even when her
coop is turned away from the wind and rain; and it is here that large
brooding hens such as the Bufforpington score their strongest point as
mothers to young ducks.
Of one thing you may be sure, a duck will not retain any more eggs in
her nest than she can conveniently cover. I know of one case where a
duck belonging to me was sitting on fifteen eggs. All appeared to be
going well, until one morning a friend of mine, on whose veracity I can
absolutely rely, saw the duck fly from her nest, close to where he was
standing, _with an egg in her bill_.
[Illustration: _W.L. Colls. Ph. Sc._
"_A tidy Mother._"]
She flew to the water, about 150 yards away, apparently without
breaking the egg; but unfortunately my friend could not get up in time
to see what she did with it. She hatched out the rest of her eggs
satisfactorily.
I presume that either the egg in question was cracked and she removed it
for the sake of cleanliness, or because she felt herself unable to sit
on so many eggs.
On many occasions I have noticed an egg left bare on the top of the
downy covering which ducks are so careful to leave over their eggs when
they go off to feed, and these eggs, if taken away and placed under a
hen, have invariably hatched. To the best of my recollection I have
never known eggs disappear from a nest containing eggs up to thirteen in
number; but over that I could quote many instances of one or two eggs
going.
This has led me to believe that the bird above alluded to had removed an
egg from her nest, as she felt herself unable to sit on so many. A good
number of eggs to leave under a duck is thirteen, and under a hen
twelve.
I have satisfied myself that hens, however small and light, break many
more eggs than ducks, and for this reason I do not care to give a hen
too many--one broken egg frequently leads to more.
It is advisable when once the ducks have begun to sit, to catch their
mates, if possible, and shut them up in some convenient place during
incubation, as otherwise they bully the sitting ducks when they come off
to feed, and you may have the annoyance of seeing a duck desert her nest
just at hatching time, as nature has warned her that she must shortly
lay again. I had one instance of this kind, when a duck which had been
sitting very steadily left her nest when the eggs were actually
"spretched" (cracked previous to hatching), and as later in the day she
showed no signs of returning we had to put them under a hen. The duck in
question never returned to her nest, but soon made another. She had not
been disturbed in any way.
Should a duck forsake its nest, place the eggs under a good hen as
quickly as possible, even if they are stone cold.
I had one case last year, which I thought hopeless. The eggs had been
sat on for about a fortnight. They were stone cold, and we knew the duck
had been off her nest for at least twelve hours, probably much longer.
Eventually twelve out of the thirteen hatched. If you are unable to
catch the drakes, the best plan is to put food and water near the nest
of the sitting birds, the pan containing the water being large enough to
allow her to wash herself thoroughly, as it is the daily tub which
generates heat, and assists most materially the successful hatching of
the young birds.
I will now deal with the vexed question as to the best kind of hens to
be employed. Personally I have strong leaning towards "Bufforpingtons";
they are, of course, heavy, and do break a few eggs--ducks' eggs being
particularly brittle--but, on the other hand, they are very staunch
sitters, quiet and easy to handle, and not likely to get excited when
other hens are hatching in close proximity to them. I have tried
lighter hens of several breeds, and I find that they break as many eggs,
and trample on as many young ducklings as the Buffs, whereas taking them
all round, they are not so easy to handle, do not sit so steadily, and
have nothing like the wonderful brooding capacity of the Buffs.
Many people put all their wild ducks' eggs under hens, and do not allow
the ducks themselves to sit. I think this is a mistake, as nature gives
to ducks far greater powers to hatch their own eggs than she gives to
hens. The daily bath, already alluded to, and the mass of warm soft
feathers, greatly assist in generating heat, and in preventing the eggs
from getting chilled.
The old duck treads more lightly when going on to her nest, and
certainly breaks far fewer eggs than the hen does. On the other hand,
ducks are not such good "brooders" as hens, and are far more likely to
get dirty when kept under coops, however often you may change the
ground, owing to the fact that they do not get to the water for the
daily bath which is essential to them; and if you leave a bath for them
in the coop, the young ducklings will be sure to get to it and probably
contract cramp.
Another strong point in favour of hens is the fact that when you have a
large number of cletches of ducks in the wired run the hens do not kill
them when they make a mistake and go to the wrong coop, whereas ducks
frequently do. If, therefore, a considerable number of broody hens are
available, the best plan is to let the ducks sit on the eggs until they
are "spretched" (cracked), and then transfer them to hens which have
been sitting for some time. This, however, is a cruel business at best.
The plan I always adopt is to note down carefully the day on which a
duck should hatch, and having satisfied myself that the young ones are
dry after hatching and ready to move, I catch the old duck on the nest,
and remove her and her whole family to a coop and run.
Care of course should be taken to see the bars in front of the coop are
not sufficiently far apart to allow the duck to escape.
Ducks' eggs take from twenty-four to twenty-nine days to hatch as a
rule, though occasionally a lot of eggs that have been put down soon
after being laid will hatch in twenty-three days, if set under a good
hen. I should put twenty-six days as the usual period of incubation.
If the ducks are well and regularly fed, they should lay an average of
twenty-three eggs apiece during the nesting season. We generally feed
ours on maize, as it is less wasteful than smaller grain, and the birds
lay well on it. One can, I think, count on 80 per cent. of the eggs
hatching, and of birds actually hatched you ought, in a fair season, to
rear 85 per cent. Having taken my reader as far as the hatching out of
the young birds, I propose in my next chapter, which I consider the most
important in the book, to deal with the question of their food, up to
the time they are fit to shoot.
HATCHING AND REARING
[Illustration: THE REARING PADDOCK]