Did you know that you can incubate duck and chicken eggs together? You can and its really very simple. On our farm, we try to keep the incubators full even if that means mixing duck and chicken eggs. We do this a lot of time in the late winter and early spring when egg production isn’t in full swing just yet. Combining eggs allows us to keep our incubators filled and provides us with some diversity in our hatchlings.
DIFFERENCES IN DUCK + CHICKEN EGGS
There are a few differences in duck and chicken eggs to take into account before trying to incubate them together.
INCUBATION TIME
First is incubation time. Incubation time is the amount of time it takes for a duckling or chick to full develop prior to hatching. Duck eggs require a longer incubation time of 28 days then chicken eggs which require only 21 days.
TEMPERATURE
Another difference is incubator temperature. Temperature for duck eggs can be slightly lower at 99.0 degrees than chicken eggs which require a temperature of 99.5 degrees for incubation. Duck eggs can successfully withstand the small increase in temperature so it is better to set the temperature to 99.5 degrees when incubating both duck and chicken eggs.
HUMIDITY
Finally, incubator humidity. Incubator humidity is something you will want to pay a lot of attention to especially towards the end of the incubation process. Both duck and chicken eggs need a steady humidity of about 55% throughout incubation.
But there is a difference in humidity requirements during “lockdown.” Lockdown is the last 3 days of your incubation process in which the incubator needs to stay closed in order for hatching conditions to be prime for a successful hatch.
During lock down duck eggs require a higher humidity of about 75% while chicken eggs only need 65-70% humidity. This is where things can become tricky. If the humidity is too high the chicks may have difficultly breaking through their shells because the inner membrane is too soft while if the the humidity is too low the ducklings membrane could dry out and cause it to “shrink wrap” around it making it impossible to hatch successfully.
The key to a successful hatch of both duck and chicken eggs is strictly monitoring the hatching process. In my experience, keeping the humidity at around 71-73% has lead to many successful combined egg hatches.
SETTING THE EGGS
Duck eggs take 28 days to hatch while chicken eggs take 21 days. So ultimately if you were to set duck and chicken eggs in the incubator the same day then the duck eggs would end up hatching an entire week before the chicken eggs.
To prevent this, you will want to set your duck eggs in the incubator 7 days before setting the chicken eggs. This allows for the duck eggs to develop that additional time prior to the beginning of the chicken egg development meaning then that once the chicken eggs are set they are now on track to have the same hatch day.
Duck Eggs day 7 will be chicken eggs day 1. They will now both hatch on day 21.
Incubating duck eggs and chicken eggs together is not a difficult process but it is important to note the there are differences in their requirements for a successful hatch.
Just to recap. Set duck eggs 7 days prior to setting chicken eggs. Temperature at 99.5. Humidity at 55% until lockdown, in which the humidity should be increased to about 72% and the hatching process should be strictly monitored for any issues that could occur.
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