Introducing younger ducklings to older ducklings

[GardenDucks]

I have a handful of ducklings age 1 week, and a larger group of ducklings age 3 weeks.
I have been keeping them as 2 separated groups.
At what age can the little ones safely join the older ones?

 

[Miss Lydia]

Have they been where they can see each other? It always helps to place each group side by side for a week or more so they get to know each other through fencing. Then you start putting them together with supervision. It's amazing the difference in size from one age to the next so you want to make sure the older ones don't start beating up the younger. They may do just fine together that is something you'll not know till you try it.
Let us know.

 

[YarrowFarms]

I was just about to ask this, mine are 5 weeks, 2 weeks, and about 3 days. I want to introduce the older flocks because I'm running out of brooder space. I have ducks in my tub, ducks sharing a brooder with silkies that are growing too slow to introduce to the big flock, and ducks in their coop in the big run. I want to put the baby ducks in with the silkies and move the medium ducks into the duck coop.

Anyhow, how did things work out for you? They're so young I'm hopeful they'd just be okay, but the size difference is amazing.

 

[Quatie]

I was just about to ask this, mine are 5 weeks, 2 weeks, and about 3 days. I want to introduce the older flocks because I'm running out of brooder space. I have ducks in my tub, ducks sharing a brooder with silkies that are growing too slow to introduce to the big flock, and ducks in their coop in the big run. I want to put the baby ducks in with the silkies and move the medium ducks into the duck coop.

Anyhow, how did things work out for you? They're so young I'm hopeful they'd just be okay, but the size difference is amazing.

Are you trying to introduce 2 week old ducklings to 5 week old ducklings? Or you trying to put ducklings with adults?

 

[wareagle044]

2 weeks a part — id say just put them together. I just mixed a flock that was about 4 months younger by putting them in the coop during the day while the older ducks free ranged as they usually do. They could see each other through the fence and the older ducks got used to seeing them in the coop.

I brought the younger ones back inside at night when I put the older flock back in the coop. I did this for maybe a week or so before letting them co-mingle. They still stick with their original flock when free ranging even though they’re sharing a coop, but they’re slowly starting to occupy spaces closer to one another while free ranging.

 

[YarrowFarms]

2 weeks a part — id say just put them together. I just mixed a flock that was about 4 months younger by putting them in the coop during the day while the older ducks free ranged as they usually do. Manner They could see each other through the fence and the older ducks got used to seeing them in the coop.

I brought the younger ones back inside at night when I put the older flock back in the coop. I did this for maybe a week or so before letting them co-mingle. They still stick with their original flock when free ranging even though they’re sharing a coop, but they’re slowly starting to occupy spaces closer to one another while free ranging.

Thank you. My ducks don't free range, there's fox and coyote and all Manner of critter that'd love an easy dinner, but I can rig up a mini-run.
I'm used to introducing chickens to each other, but I'm still new to ducks.

 

[GardenDucks]

I'm happy to say that the two groups of ducklings (2-week age difference) are now one big happy, unified flock. Miss Lydia, thanks for the advice. Here are all the details (ages and timeline approximate):

Ages (2.5 weeks & a few days old):
Nighttime: Separated. Older ducklings in outdoor duck coop with brooder lamp. Little ducklings indoors in brooder.
Daytime: Separated. While the older ducklings were foraging in the grass, if the temperature was warm enough, I let the little ducklings out in the grass as well, but enclosed in "dog" fence (lined with hardware cloth so they couldn't wiggle out, and covered with a tarp to deter hawk-type predators). This arrangement would last between a couple hours or most of the daytime, depending on the weather. The two flocks generally ignored each other.

Ages (3 week & 1 week):
Nighttime: Same as above (separated).
Daytime: Same as above (separated), except that for short times we let the younger flock out of their fenced area (heavily supervised) to mingle with the older flock. There was a lot of pecking, and we intervened after a few minutes. The next day, repeated this, and again, a lot of pecking. Nobody was getting hurt but it was unnerving to watch. The younger ones seemed to genuinely want to join the older flock, running along behind them etc.

My impression with the pecking was that literally every individual from the older flock had to peck every individual from the younger flock to establish their "pecking" order. Any thoughts? Similar/different experiences? One technique I found to help was letting just a few of the older individuals at a time mingle with the younger flock (e.g. put the rest of older flock in the kiddie pool or the coop). Then rotating those older individuals. That way it wasn't so much pecking all at once.

Ages (3.5 weeks & 1.5 weeks):
Nighttime: Together but separated. Before their first night in this new arrangement, we moved the older flock's coop (modular) to new location so that it would be neutral territory, expanded it, then sectioned off part of it with chicken wire for the younger flock. Each flock had a separate door for entry/exit, and a separate brooder lamp (though some folks would put the lamp above the middle of the separation fence). The two flocks could see each other but could not access each other. The older flock had a larger area (probably 3 times larger) because they had 3 times as many individuals.
Feeding: Separate. Younger ducks had their food and water inside their area of the coop. Older ducks were fed and watered outside of the coop.
Daytime: We kept the younger flock locked inside their coop during the day, except for heavily supervised opportunities to forage as a separate flock or mingle with the older flock, however they chose. Older flock had free-range.

Ages (4 weeks & 2 weeks):
Nighttime: Same as above. (Together but separated.)
Feeding: Separate. Older flock was fed in same area as before. Younger flock's feeding area moved to outside of coop, but about 15-20 feet away from the older flock's feeding area. Feeding times were closely supervised to keep older ducks away from eating the younger ducks' feed.
Daytime: Both flocks had free-range, but generally functioned as 2 separate flocks.

We left both doors open during the day so both flocks could come and go as they wished. Occasionally an older individual wandered into the younger flock's coop area, and we shooed them out, but generally the older flock was more interested in foraging etc with the rest of their flock. Sometimes if the whole younger flock was in their coop area, we'd close their door and give them a few hours alone. The younger flock would sometimes try to follow the older flock in foraging, and sometimes they were successful, but often they couldn't keep up, so they would give up and forage separately.

At this point, the older flock's alphas (and most of the older individuals) generally accepted/tolerated the younger ones, but there were a few older individuals who were not welcoming and would "peck" the younger ones away if they got too close. One of the older individuals was actually protective of the younger ones (turns out he's the alpha drake of the older flock--definitely a keeper). Alpha drake didn't intervene in the squabbles between members of the two flocks, but if he sensed external threats, he would move away from the older flock and closer to the younger flock to watch them.

Ages (4.5 weeks & 2.5 weeks):
Nighttime: Transitioned to being fully together, no separation.
Feeding: Same as above. Still closely supervised.
Daytime: Started foraging etc as 1 unified flock.

Around this time, about 1 week after we had first put both flocks in the same coop at night with a separation fence, we decided that they were ready to be combined at night. One evening, we found that all of the individuals from both flocks had gone into the older flock's section of the coop, and were settling in for the night. At that moment we removed the chicken wire separation, and from then on both flocks had full access to the entire coop.

Post-Combining Issues
Generally everybody got along well. As the feeding/watering combined, there were 1 or 2 older individuals who would be territorial about that. So feeding times had to be monitored for a long time.

Because of the size difference, if the flock would startle and run very quickly, sometimes the younger individuals would fall and get stepped on accidentally by the older individuals, not injured thankfully.

At this point, though, it's one big happy flock.

 

[GardenDucks]

I was just about to ask this, mine are 5 weeks, 2 weeks, and about 3 days. I want to introduce the older flocks because I'm running out of brooder space. I have ducks in my tub, ducks sharing a brooder with silkies that are growing too slow to introduce to the big flock, and ducks in their coop in the big run. I want to put the baby ducks in with the silkies and move the medium ducks into the duck coop.

Anyhow, how did things work out for you? They're so young I'm hopeful they'd just be okay, but the size difference is amazing.

I would have the same inclination that you have to start by combining the 5-weeks group with the 2-weeks group. But I would definitely go slowly, giving them some supervised times to be together briefly, but having some fencing etc to separate them, so they can see each other all the time but can't access each other unless supervised. Then based on your observations, remove the separation when they're all getting along well.

Feeding times will probably have to be supervised for a long time even after they are happily combined. Until their size difference evens out.

For the youngest group, maybe start introducing them now to a limited number of the older ducklings, under supervision. Or maybe wait a week or so for that. I can't speak to combining them with Silkies or not.

The main thing I think is to observe and supervise their interactions so you know what to do.


Further comments which might or might not be relevant:

1. During the first 2 weeks little ducklings are supposed to have continuous access to food whereas ages over 2-weeks the feeding transitions to 2-3 times per day (as per Dave Holderread, Storey's Guide), then generally twice a day until eventually it can be once a day with extensive foraging access. With that difference in the feeding schedules it would hard for me to combine ducklings under 2 weeks with those over 2 weeks.

2. The brooder temperature requirements vary by age of duckling. 90 degrees for the first week, then 5 degrees lowered per week thereafter (Holderread). Probably not such an issue now in summer.

3. With mixed age ducklings I had to offer a variety of waterers to make that everyone could reach the water, and dunk their heads in the water, without getting trapped in the water, or running out of water.

 

[YarrowFarms]

@GardenDucks thank you for your detailed play by play and other insights. I'm still learning and every bit helps!

This is what I've come up with so far. They have a small-ish coop (hubby will have to make me a new one before long, we were only planning on a 3-4 ducks. We have 12. I think chicken math must translate to ducks too.) Anyway, smallish coop, so I split it with a baby gate. One side is bigger and has the food and water for the younger ducks. The older two will just be in the smaller end to sleep.
In the morning I'll let the young'uns out into the run and give the older ducks their fill of feed. Then onto supervised *follow around the cooler big kids* and splashing in the pond time until the Littles go back into their coop with makeshift run so everyone can safely see and be seen. Then rinse and repeat until they're assimilated, and do it all over again with the three bitty baby ducks in the brooder.


Introducing ducks is way more involved than chickens. I can usually get them all together in a week's time. This is a lot! I hope one of these ducks will be a broody hen so she can do all the hard work next year!

 

[GardenDucks]

Probably the approach I used was excessively cautious. Some of mine were pretty territorial/cliquey and I felt like I had to go slower, but others' ducklings might be different. Maybe the 1-week approach that you used with chickens would be ok too--I don't know about chickens. With feeding, if the "under-2-weeks" ducklings are mixed in, then I guess everybody would just get continuous feed. I've heard of people using a dividing fence that is sized just perfectly so the littles can go in and out to access their continuous feed (while the bigger ones are kept out) but none of the various fencing I had on hand would work for that.

Sounds like you have a good set up. Let us know how it goes. Somehow I also ended up with more ducks than planned...