24 Ducklings May 20th

The East and West nests started incubation on the same day, hatched about a month later both on the same day, and at around 9:15 am on the 20th all of the ducklings left within a few minutes of each other. Each nest box started out with 12 eggs although more eggs were added by other ducks in later days, bringing the count up to 16 and 17. None of the late eggs hatched and all of the original eggs produced ducklings. I can tell because I put a tiny dot on each of the original eggs on the day incubation starts if possible: as soon as I see the duck is away from the nest and I can safely open the nest box.

Wood ducks and even a hooded merganser continue to visit the nest boxes very briefly – a few minutes – and not every day. So some are still looking for nest sites and there might be a chance that another round will occur. In the past nest boxes have sometimes been used twice. If that does happen I’ll certainly post about it and set up the cameras again.

Otherwise this wraps up another year of watching and streaming video about these fun and interesting birds. I hope you enjoyed it!

And … Good luck little ducks!