Cutie, Jessie and Fuzzie Travel Upstate!

Well, it had to happen at some point....our three ducklings have left school and gone upstate to live.  They will be living with the chickens we hatched last year at a PS58 family's house in the country!

Ready for an adventure, exploring the hallways!

Outside in the sunshine for the first time.

Waiting to get in the car!

We will all miss the ducklings but it is nice to know that they will have a larger space to live in and be with other ducks once they are big enough!

Our Ducklings are Getting Bigger!

Cutie, Jessie and Fuzzie are 9 days old and SO big now!  They still love hanging out together and exploring the science room!  They drink a container of water every four or five hours now.  They love to play in any kind of water and make an absolute mess in their brooder every day!

They are with us only for a few more days.  Then they are heading upstate with a PS58 family to live in the country with other ducks and our chicks (now chickens) from last year!  They will be missed for sure!

Looking out the door at the people walking by!

Nibbling on the swimming pool!

Checking out the classroom.

Drink and rest.  Drink and rest.

The Ducklings Take Their First Swim!

Cutie, Jessie and Fuzzie had their first swim during Pre-k's visit to the science classroom.  Those little ducklings had a great time!  They were a little nervous at first, especially when only one duck was in the pool, but once all three were in....they had a blast! 

Meet Cutie, Jessie and Fuzzy!

Cutie, Jessie and Fuzzy were taken out of the incubator at the end of the day today and put in the brooder (90 degrees inside).  I had to teach one of the ducklings, Cutie, how to drink water and eat food and then the other ducklings followed suit. They were fast learners. It is their first night outside of the incubator!

There is still one egg in the incubator.  Tomorrow is the actual hatch date, so we will see what happens.

The Ducklings Have Arrived!

I was so excited to see if any of the ducklings hatched that I got to work a half an hour early!  But when I arrived, I only saw....bigger pips on three of the eggs.

Three eggs ready to go!

You can see the ducklings beak on the left.

And out comes the duckling!

The first duckling hatched during science with K-127.  They came up with the name Cutie!

Half an hour later...duckling number two arrives!

They love to snuggle together.

They love to sleep together.

One more egg with a pip!

This silly duckling (#2) got it's head stuck in an empty shell!
I had to pull it off!

A Mother's Day Surprise!

Today is day 25 for the duck eggs.  Only three days before they hatch!  Today is the day I take the eggs out of the egg turner so that when the duckling start to hatch, they won't get caught in the turner.  I also increase the humidity level from 55% to 67% percent to help keep the duckling moist which helps with the hatching process.

Imagine my surprise when I looked in the incubator and saw that three of the eggs had pips (where the duckling pecks the shell to get out)!  Once you see the pip the duckling will hatch anywhere from 24 to 36 hours later.  I could even hear them chirping inside their shell!

Now we wait.......

The Duck Eggs are Half Way There!

Today is day 14! We started out with 10 eggs, but 2 of the eggs were not fertilized. We now have 8 eggs! Four of the eggs look pretty healthy, but I'm not sure about the other 4.  Fingers crossed!

This large egg was cracked by the egg turner. I read online, that wax
can help seal the cracks and prevent bacteria from getting in. 
We'll see if it works for us!

The way to check the growth of the duck embryo is to candle the egg.  To do that, I hold a flashlight on the egg and see how it looks inside!  The glow should be orangey red and you should see blood vessels.  At day 14, you might be able to see the ducks eye and even see it move around inside the egg!

This is a healthy egg.  You can see the blood vessels!

In 11 days I take the eggs out of the turner and place them on the mesh bottom of the incubator.  I also increase the humidity level from 55 % to 67%.  Then we will wait out the last three days until the eggs begin to hatch!

The Duck Eggs are Here!

The duck eggs are here!  I picked the 10 eggs up at the Hart's Brook Preserve yesterday.  

We have 4 Pekin eggs.

The ducklings.

The adult ducks.

And 6 Rouen eggs.

The ducklings.

The adult ducks.

The eggs are now in the egg turner that slowly rotates the eggs.  The temperature is a steady 100 degrees with a 55% humidity level!

Once a day, the eggs are turned over.  The x
helps keep track of the turning.

And now the waiting begins!  It takes 28 days for the eggs to hatch.  Our hatch date is around May 15th!  Stay tuned!

Fluffy and Friends Return to Harvest Moon Farm and Orchard.

Today is the day that Fluffy travelled to Harvest Moon Farm.  It is hard to say good bye to our duckling, but I think Fluffy will have a great time on the farm. 

Fluffy one day old.

Fluffy eleven days old.

All the ducks getting ready in the travel container.

They have their seat belts on in Miss Amelia's car.

The smaller ducks go in the back container,
the bigger ones are in the front.

These ducks are much bigger.
They are starting to lose their downy feathers.

Here are some ducklings the same size as ours!
There is a crested duck with it's pouffy hair in the middle of the picture.

This is the pond on the farm!

I will really miss Fluffy.  It was a lot of fun watching Fluffy grow (and nibble on our shoe laces) but I know he or she will have lots of fun at the farm roaming freely!

Our Duckling Has a Name!

On Friday, the three Pre-K classes voted for a name for our duckling!  Would it be Rosabella? Fluffy or Quack?  It was a close race, but Fluffy won by a narrow margin!

Fluffy now spends the night with her other duck friends in Miss Amelia's room. They are all so happy to snuggle with one another. They've become good duck friends! 

Since Fluffy is the oldest duckling, all the other ducks follow her lead...right back to the science room!

Bundles comes and stays with Fluffy during the day so Fluffy won't be lonely. They loved swimming in the pool.  Well, really relaxing, as the water wasn't deep enough.  Everyone thought it was pretty funny that they both pooped in the pool right away!

Mr. Paul came to see Fluffy!

Fluffy still likes shoe laces!

Fluffy is getting so big now!

The end of another busy day!

Day Four with the Duckling!

Today the duckling went visiting around our school!  First it went to room 205 to meet some relatives!  Miss Amelia's class has three ducklings (one is still in the incubator)!  We had some fun duck time!

Later in the day we went to meet the kids in Mrs. Simm's class.  The duckling really likes nibbling on shoe laces!  And boy can it (we don't know if it's a girl or a boy - not until it gets older) run fast!!

Next we went to visit Mrs Hatheway's class since they were next door!  More shoelaces to nibble on!

We decided to go through the gym to get back to the brooder and what should we see?  Three kindergarten classes!!  The little duck had so much fun running and sliding around the gym!

Then some people came to visit the duckling! By the way, Pre-K is voting on a name for the duckling tomorrow!

Ms G stopped by!

Ms Dello Stritto came by too!