I’m Rotaxengine and we have been keeping Indian Runners for years now and selling their eggs on eBay for over 3 years. I drafted the following to help you select your ducklings and provide a little extra information to give you and them a good start.   

Maybe first you need to ask, why keep Indian Runners?  I would say because they have a unique and long history dating back some 2000 years. They are a very hardy duck and produce a lot of eggs -  around 200 per year. Strictly speaking they do not need a pond like other ducks but they do love to splash around in one and of course it is essential that they have clean water to drink and somewhere to wash their heads. They look great walking around the garden and are entertaining to watch. Being so active they are best allowed to free range and they spend their time, from the moment you let them out until you put them away, foraging for snails and worms. Unlike some other ducks they can NOT fly away.

Firstly you will have chosen your method of hatching – a nice loving Silkie hen maybe or you could Buy an incubator on Ebay  Having sorted that little detail out the next thing is to choose what colour you want your ducks to be – all black, all white or a mixture of colours.  

If you want just a single colour then you could expect to pay  more for them. Personally I like to see a mixture running around the place – that way I can tell who is who and it makes it easier to give them a name. If you are going for ducklings of a single colour, ensure that the seller does genuinely offer one particular colour of ducks or else you will probably end up with a mix of colours.  

You will also look at the sellers listing and review their feedback, BUT – you should read through the lines of the feedback. My experience is that some people give feedback when the eggs arrive and other when they hatch. To a large extent the hatching is down to your incubator and your incubation skills – not just fertility or packaging or the postman.

Before you buy look at the total purchase price. That is the cost of the eggs and that unfortunate cost of postage. I pack 6 Runner duck eggs in two egg boxes placed inside a wine box and the postage cost is only £3.45 by first class post. Next day special delivery costs just over £6.80. But I do not charge for the egg boxes or the wine boxes!

Some sellers use polystyrene boxes specially made for sending eggs through the post but these do not always stop breakages. All eggs are different sizes and shapes – the polystyrene boxes are made only in one size and eggs can flop around and break. I have sold and sent eggs to Italy with no breakages.

Standard first class post is fine for most deliveries – and in my experience just as safe.

Even if your incubator (electric or a live hen) will take 24 eggs, will your garden take 24 ducks? You should also remember that you will get on average 50/50 of each sex and you need to think what you do with the drakes. No you can’t eat them, not that you would, after looking after them from birth, also there is no meat on them!

You only need 1 drake per 6/8 females – if you want fertile eggs.  The drakes will not normally fight but they will be very sexually active from March until late September and they will have favourite females who will suffer with sore and bleeding heads from mating if there are too many drakes. So YOU will have to sort them out!

Eggs do not have to be “fresh” that day to be incubated  – if you think about it,  a duck will sit on say 8 -10 eggs but lays only one egg per day.  Research has shown that there is a loss of about 3% hatchability for eggs stored 7 days and about 10% loss for those stored 14 days. Obviously with say a purchase of only 6 eggs you want to increase your chances to the full - so try and ensure your seller has more than 1 female!!

If you have a broody hen then great, but if not make sure you follow the instructions on the incubator and maybe put it on the day you buy your eggs. Most people will underestimate the relative humidity (RH), which is more important for hatching ducks eggs – you may need a larger tray of water and if you don’t have a hydrometer try and Buy one on Ebay

Some people advise you to let the eggs stand for a day and others don’t -  I haven’t found any proof that this matters.

After about 28 days you should have some ducklings hatching out – don’t get impatient if they don’t hatch on the 28th day. You should wait at least 3 days more than expected. You have waited 28 days so why not a few more.

If your eggs don’t hatch out – don’t just through them away – break one egg open to see if a duckling had started to develop – if it had YOU must have done something wrong! The eggs will not smell.  Buyers have contacted me to say the eggs were not fertile only to find, when I asked them to break open the eggs,  that all the eggs had started to develop but had stopped – maybe some one had turn the incubator off or forgot to top up the water.

So having hatched your new duckling you need to look after them – don’t let them drown – ducks hatched from under a hen or from the incubator can not swim. As they have had no contact with a real mother duck no natural oils have been transferred to the duckling, hence there is no oil to keep them afloat – remember the ducklings don’t know this.

One customer of mine contacted me to say all the eggs were fertile and had started to pip (break out from the shell) but died as they could not get out. This is common if your RH is low at the latter stages of incubation and the shell is a little hard. If this happens help it – remove a little shell at a time over say a few hours.

And if you are going to buy and keep ducks – why not buy a book? If you buy it at the same time as your eggs you will have 28 days to read it – again you can buy a book on ebay

If you do go for Indian Runner Ducks I am sure you will soon agree that they are head and shoulders above the rest.

Thanks for reading this guide. If you found it useful please leave your comments.
We hope you enjoy the experience and pleasure of keeping Indian Runner Ducks. 

Thank you

Ken & Zoe (eBay member name: rotaxengine)  4th Feb 2008.