No ducklings

Grace the chook/duck has been sitting on duck eggs for 6 weeks. Last egg "dispatched" yesterday. She puts them in the water container with a float. This egg had a 3/4 hatched duckling. She did this every week or so to all the other eggs - one egg at a time. It is about 12 feet downhill from her nest to the water trough which is a foot off the ground so it would not have been easy for her to put it in there and there would be no one else, except chooks, who might do it (very secure yard at night when it happened). Anyone know why?

Grace is a duck raised by a chook.

Dear Pamela,

I don't know which is worse: to have no eggs because of the crows or to have them, and all the expectation that goes with it, and then have none hatch. I don't know why she does that. Is she trying to get them to swim ie a wire has gone wrong in her brain and she feels that they should be born and swiming? Lee

Well Grace has decided to be a chook. Will have nothing to do with Lucky the drake, and her brother, and rightly so! She climbs up into the hen house at 6 pm and puts herself to bed with the chooks and chases the little Penguins (my 6 black pullets) out of the box they perch on and plonks herself in the box. Her mum told her that if she cannot jump onto a roost, then it is OK to sleep in a laying box.

She could go into the duck enclosure, now separate, b ut will not. I think she has made a wise decision. I like these "dooks" like Grace. I might put some of Daisy's eggs under a chook as I doubt that Grace's eggs are fertile now as she will have nothing to do with Lucky as I said. Grace is very noisy and quite stroppy with Lucky - a very confident dook and she was raised by a great chook.

Last night Grace also put all the spinach stalks that I gave the chooks yesterday into their water bath. She clearly thinks that anything that is not for eating goes in there or something???