Our 2 Khaki Campbells need their daily bath and the water needs to be changed at least once a week. You may want to rethink the work that will be involved when you go with the kiddie pool. We bought a black cement mixing plastic bin from Home Depot. It's a little smaller than a kiddie pool but just right for two ducks. They need a little stool to get in and a big rock inside to help them jump out. If they can't get in and out of the water easily they can get injured rather quickly. The pool is heavy to dump but I put it under a fruit tree and it's free fertilizer. Grows great cherries. The work is a small price to pay for how happy the ducks are. They are in there winter and summer, rain, snow, sleet, hail. They love it.

I love all ducks so it's really hard to pick out a favourite breed. Most domestic ducks are derived from Mallards so their personalities are similar. I've had several different breeds of ducks. I've found the lighter weight breeds to be more skittish but they usually become calmer when they're older. If I had to pick a favourite breed it would be Silver Appleyard ducks. They seem to have more character and are somewhat friendlier. They're large ducks and the females lay really well. I'd recommend 2-6 ducks for new owners. Of course the pen size will depend on the number of ducks you end up with but the more room they have, the fewer problems there are. The most important thing is to limit the number of males. If you have 6 ducks then no more than 2 should be male.

Look on the Internet to find out if Magpie ducks will incubate (set on) their own eggs. As long as they are not in with a lot of other birds, I suspect that she would succeed in hatching her own. Sometimes they lay an egg every other day, until they reach what they consider to be a full clutch. Before they are actually starting to set on the eggs seriously, you'll notice that she will start building the nest and lining it with fluff from her own breast. This is, of course, if she will set on her own. I reckon that those eggs will be good for at least two weeks, while she gathers more. If you decide to use an incubator, I'd recommend one with a thermostat, hydrometer, forced air and egg turner; that is if you can afford it. I used to purchase the Styrofoam cheapo incubators, about every 12 months. They would get contaminated during hatching and after a couple of uses there was no way to use them successfully, as the eggs would become contaminated and cause sick, deformed chicks. Ducks require a bit more humidit'y for incubation, so you'd have to research that. I have hatched duck eggs under a broody hen. That works. But once they hatch, you have to take the ducklings and raise them yourself. The hen doesn't "speak the same language" as the ducklings. They don't communicate well and the ducklings abandon the hen after less than a day. Hope this helps, George

I really appreciate your help. Thank you so much for your replies. I can't believe in all these years I've never noticed that female Mallards have those lovely blue and white wing feathers. I had only noticed they were female Mallards when I'd seen them with a male. And when they're swimming about, those colors don't show. You've helped me to see something special and beautiful about a bird that I never noticed before. It is a huge curiosity why there were no males in the group.