Well, here goes. My woman duck (Blue Swede) was sitting on a clutch of 30 duck eggs (Rouen/Buff/Blue Swede/Whatever cross). Five have hatched out and I'm not seeing her sitting on the rest. So..... I brought 11 of them in (I left her 10 and am keeping 4 of the babies warm under a brooder light), put them in a glass pie plate with a bowl of water next to them in my Excalibur dehydrator. Should work in principle, but at what temperature? I figure that they only have a day or more to hatch if they are going to. HELP!!! This is my extra money for my son's 4-H needs!! Thanks! I searched all the old threads and not anything quite like this.... smiles to all!

-- Gailann Schrader (gtschrader@aol.com), May 12, 2001

Answers

I keep mine at 100 degrees,can you ajust the temp on the dehydrator? Daryll

-- Daryll (twincrk@hotmail.com), May 12, 2001.

Yes, I can adjust the temp for different drying needs - it goes down to about 85 degrees. I will adjust to 100 degrees but should I leave the door on or off? There is a fan blowing across the eggs currently.

Thanks!!

-- Gailann Schrader (gtschrader@aol.com), May 12, 2001.

Gailann, duck eggs need moisture in order to be able to peep. You need to be wetting the eggs down some or they won't hatch (imho) I would think the bowl of water would help, but you might want to spray them ever so often. Can you get a steady temp with the door on? If not I would close the door leaving just a crack open. Hope it works for you. Let us know.

-- diane (gardiacaprines@yahoo.com), May 12, 2001.

Yep, I am misting them regularly. I am in the process of locating my cheese thermometer (Sheesh, do we homesteaders EVER only use something for one purpose?) to put in there to watch the temp. Oh, and by the by, I AM A DUCK MOM!!!! One of the eggs was peeping an hour ago and I helped him/her out! Amazing how they are jammed into the egg! I got him/her out and he/she is under the brooder light now. I was going to build an incubator (got the plans from here at the forum) but never got a chance to. Thanks for the info! (Nuthin' better than babies running around. Rabbit babies, goat babies, chicken babies, duck babies, goose setting on eggs/babies, guinea will probably come up with babies too!)

-- Gailann Schrader (gtschrader@aol.com), May 12, 2001.

Congratulations! You are a very ingenious person. I would have never thought to use my dehydrator that way. It pays to think outside of the box!

-- Sheryl in ME (radams@sacoriver.net), May 12, 2001.

Gailann-- I hope your son is also involved in this alternative hatching method, if the money earned from this project goes towards HIS projects. This would make a nice demonstration or illustrated talk for him to do for his club. Not sure what state you're in, or what the state's requirements are for project completion, but it would sure look good here in the South Dakota poultry project.

Hopefully by now you've got more than just the one duckling hatched from your deydrator. Next time you might want to disable the fan, though, if you're going to leave them in there for any length of time. Let us know what your results were!

-- Lynn (ljbixler@dtgnet.com), May 14, 2001.

There was a suggestion to disable the fan on an excalibur when hatching eggs. That is not a good solution, because the heating element was designed to be used with the fan on. With the fan off, the protective temperature sensor would detect a malfuction, and open the temperature sensitive fuse. This would prevent tne dehydrator heating element from working until the fuse was reinstalled, and the fan was enabled.

I am very famaliar with the Excalibur because I designed it.

-- roger orton (roger@excaliburdehydrator.com), January 10, 2002.