New to Indian Runner Ducks

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Red Face

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Hi guys,

Great forum you have here, I've been lurking around unregistered for a few weeks reading various threads!

I'm currently researching getting some indian runner ducks.
I've wanted some for about 10 years but it's never been practical as I've not been home regularly enough to care for them.

I'm now married with three children, two of which are 4 year old twin boys. When I mentioned getting ducks a few months ago they where obviously very excited and all for it!

I've recently changed jobs and now work full time from my office at home so I can be on hand for the ducks whenever they need me.

So, I have a nice plot of land at the bottom of my garden and my initial idea was to get 3 or 4 ducks and a drake (indian runners).
This is still the plan but I'm having serious issues getting hold of exactly what I want.

Ideally I want 4 or 5 young (sexed) ducklings, but nowhere seems to have any available and cannot commit to when they will have any.

This has lead me onto whether I'm capable of incubating some myself, I would love to try this and it'd be great for the twins to see.

My only reservation with this is, what if I end up with 3 drakes and 3 ducks, I've heard that too many drakes is a bad thing.
What do I do with the unwanted drakes?

Any help you could give me on this would be much appreciated.

Cheers.

:)
 
Welcome to the forum :)
Great to see someone with such care and consideration towards keeping ducks.
Where are you based?
Incubation is a complex process and yes, you could end up will all boys!
Anyway let us know where you are and we can go from there :)
Zo
 
Hi Zo,

I live in Preston, Lancashire.

We have a few breeders locally but they have all said it's a bit out of season for runners.
I've looked into buying from a breeder further a field and then paying for a animal courier to deliver the ducklings.

Even then I've struggled to find somewhere with sexed ducklings.

The more I think about incubating the more I want to try it haha.

Could I try and give away my unwanted ducklings? Also would I be capable of sexing them when young?
 
Hi,
I incubated runner ducks and ended up with 2 males and 2 females,they live very happily together. I think it's about 3 months or so when the female's quack gives her away as it's quite loud compared to the male but unless you've both sexes you'll have no comparison.
There are lots of posts on here about incubating to give you some tips. There are also a couple of "bibles" I read and reread during the process.
Katie Thear "Incubation. A guide to Hatching and rearing" and Chris &Mike Ashton "Keeping ducks and geese" both available on Amazon.
I obsessed about the humidity throughout the process later to find that a lot of people incubate dry until the last few days. I live in the north east and we have high humidity anyway. If you decide to incubate, we'll support you through.
 
Excellent, I think I'm going to take the plunge and have a go at incubating.

The next job is purchasing an incubator, I've seen some on ebay priced at around £50 would these be suitable?
 
I hatched in a covatutto 12 that I got for £5 in a car boot sale. I've seen Brinsea for sale on Ebay and I think they are fine.There was an inci for sale on here recently-It may still be available.
The expensive ones do most of the work for you-automatic turning for example.Mine didn't do that but as I'm at home most of the day it didn't matter and I enjoyed doing my bit.
Don't forget once hatched you'll need a brooder for a few weeks with a heat source-all adding to the expense.
Mine then went outside at 3 weeks as it was summer time. The earlier in the season you do it the more heat you'll need to provide.
 
Ok cool, I've just bought an incubator!

This is really happening now haha.

I'll hang fire until I have the incubator before I buy the eggs I think.

When they hatch I have a large dog cage I can put them in, also my mother in law breeds puppies so she has a heat lamp I can borrow to keep them warm, I presume this will be suitable?

Is it wrong to be ridiculously excited haha?
 
You'll need to stabilise the heat in the inci before you put the eggs in which will take 2-3 days. Also let the eggs "settle" for 24hrs once you get them before they go in. It may be a bit early yet anyway-of my 2 ducks only one has started to lay a few days ago-and fertility will improve as the weeks go by.
Yes a dog cage is fine and the heat lamp your mother in law has.
It's a very exciting time and the 28 days will be endless, I felt like an expectant auntie!
Where are you thinking of getting your eggs from? There are some on Ebay but some sellers display photos of other peoples stock so be careful.
I got mine from www.poplarfarmcottage. 5 of the 6 eggs were fertile, one failed to hatch so I was left with 4 ducklings.
Jo
 
Excellent, thanks for all of the info, Jo.

I'll ensure I check the feedback from the ebay seller. The one I've seen is selling a mixture of 6 white and chocolate runners.

This will hopefully be perfect as I'm after a mixture.

As I said earlier in the thread I'd like approximately 3 ducks and a drake so I think I'll try hatching all 6.

Would it be unlikely that all 6 will hatch?
 
I preferred a mixture, it adds to the excitement of seeing what you get and helps with the identification.
Poplar farm have no eggs available at the moment when I checked their website, this wil be because as I said earlier they are only just coming back into lay and the fertility will be lower at the moment therefore they won't sell them.
You may get all 6 hatching but with mine, one failed to hatch for no apparent reason-it had been the most active throughout incubation and was the one I would have put money on would hatch, on the otherhand one who was very quiet and barely moved when I candled it is now a healthy and very noisy girl.
If you do get eggs now you may well find that not all the eggs are fertile.
 
Now, whilst I'm waiting for the eggs and incubator to arrive I need to think about fixing up their area.

I have approximately 50 square metres for them to live in (11m x 5m).
At the moment it's covered in gravel. I plan to rake all of the gravel to one small area, say 2m x 2m and use that to put a small pool on. Hopefully this will drain well and not get muddy.

For the rest of the area I thought about putting down membrane and then covering it in either wood chip or rubber chippings.
All of this area will be uncovered and I plan to get a duck house for them for shelter. I've seen a few online for approximately £100.

I read on here that the rubber chips are good initially but in the long term they go a bit smelly and hard to maintain, also it's quite a big area for rubber chips and would be expensive.

Thanks for all the info guys, you are being really helpful! :)
 
Sorry,can't help you with this one as mine free range, but do have a duck house for night time. As I live in an area where grouse and pheasant shooting makes mega bucks for the land owner there are no foxes so don't have a predator problem. They are messy critters and will turn wet grass into a bog in no time however so need as much space as you can give them. To bathe in they have a large pot sink that I can clean out daily and a large bucket to dip their heads in.
Good luck!
 
Quick update guys.

The incubator has arrived today :)

I'm hoping the eggs will arrive in the next few days. I wanted a mixture of colours, so I've bought a mix of 6 chocolate and white and 6 lavender, black and blue.

I initially only wanted 5 or 6 ducks, but I've bought 12 eggs.

Would it be seen as inhumane if I was to only incubate 4 of each set?

Or should I incubate all of them and then give the unwanted ones away?

Could I release them into the wild or is this frowned upon?
 
Hello Redface. You could just sell any surplus as young ducklings/adults. Spring is the time of year people like to refresh their stocks.
I wouldn't advise releasing into the wild, they would very easily be predated being non-flying. Also, although good foragers it may be difficult for them to survive as they have been reared as domestic ducks.
At this stage however, I wouldn't count your ducklings before they hatched.. ;) :D
 
Haha! Ok so I should incubate all 12 then and sell the excess ducklings.

That's fine by me as it means I can pick the best colours!

Thanks Foxy.
 
Hi again guys.

I've just received the first six eggs in the post, the second six should arrive tomorrow.

They are currently in a polystyrene box, am I best leaving them in this until the others arrive?

If not how should I store them temporarily?
 
I've put them in an egg box with the fat end up on a slight tilt, in the garage,

The temperature in there is 51 degrees F.

I'm going to tilt them before I go to bed and then first thing in the morning.

I hope this is ok, if it isn't someone tell me quickly!
 
I normally store at room temp, but as long as it is not too cold I expect they will be fine. A gentle turn twice a day before being placed in the incubator will be OK :-)17
 
Thanks Foxy.

I tilted them the other way this morning and I'll bring them up to room temperature gradually this afternoon for incubation tonight.

The incubator has been on for 24 hours and seems to be running a bit warmer than it says on the built in temperature gauge (compared to my digital one) so I've had to alter that a bit.

I've started a blog with photos and stuff if anyone's interested the link is in my profile :)
 
Help required urgently please guys!

I'm getting some serious differences in temps when trying to regulate my incubator. The eggs are due to go in tomorrow night so I need to get it sorted.

I've bought a digital thermometer/humidity reader that reads 37.5, I have a cooking thermometer (the skewer type) that reads 39.1!!

The one I've just bought is a digital one off eBay, it was less than a tenner, would it be innacurate. I'm not sure which one to believe!
 
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