Learning the best way to breed ducks is very important for raising backyard ducks or commercial ducks successfully. The best strategy for breeding ducks is to keep males and females separate.
Male ducks, especially Muscovy drakes, are very aggressive to female ducks and ducklings too. This results in eggs getting broken as males chase down females. She lays 15 eggs, but you will be surprised to find her left with just 10 eggs on the day she hatches them and the other 5 eggs disappear without any trace. To solve that mystery, simply separate male ducks from female ducks. You will only bring the females to the males when it’s time for mating or breeding, and this is usually a month after they hatch their eggs. Ducks prefer to mate in the water, it is more natural, and they are categorized as waterfowl for a reason! Nonetheless, ducks will mate on land if that is where the female is when they decide to copulate.
Hatching Eggs
I’ve heard people saying if ducks do not mate in duck ponds the eggs will be infertile. That’s a total lie and not true at all. My ducks don’t have a duck pond, but they always hatch eggs every quarter. For excellent breeding which results in the highest egg hatching ratio, different duck breeds should follow their respective male-to-female ratio so as to achieve successful breeding. Generally, about 5 to 10 ducks can be mated to each drake. In colder weather, limit the number of ducks per drake to five. In warmer weather increase it to eight or even 10.
Heavy-sized breeds like Muscovy and other meat breeds will generally have a ratio of 1 male to up to 6 females while lighter breeds such as the Khaki Campbell and Indian Runner can have a maximum male-to-female ratio of nearly 1 male to 10 females. Never keep too many male ducks or too many female ducks for breeding purposes as keeping too many male ducks with too few female ducks can cause injury to the females because they can be mated too often and male ducks, known as drakes, have very big and very long reproductive organs.
Different breeds have different breeding seasons. Some domestic ducks generally breed year-round. But some breeds have different breeding seasons which go from late winter through spring to early summer. During the mating season, the ducks generally show mating behavior and lay eggs. During the breeding season, mating behavior will include neck biting, pecking, head bobbing, and attempts at mounting by the male.
