Larkwell Valley (2023)

[troyer]

Phoenix might be a loss. It looked like all of the eggs were cracked. I'm having a hard time getting my ducks ro get enough calcium. They want nothing to do with oystershell, but absolutely gobble egg shells, they don't even care about the yolk.

Then feed them all the egg shells they want.

 

[JacinLarkwell]

Then feed them all the egg shells they want.

I only have so many eggs I can give them though.

 

[JacinLarkwell]

Moose accidentally got seperated from his girls. He walked out of the pen and I didn't notice, and the door shut. I came back with more water to hear him making his hiss fit sounds and the girls all trilling, and every one of them bouncing off the wire separating them.

Pekin ended up leaving that group and going to the Swedish group

 

[NanaK]

Phoenix might be a loss. It looked like all of the eggs were cracked. I'm having a hard time getting my ducks ro get enough calcium. They want nothing to do with oystershell, but absolutely gobble egg shells, they don't even care about the yolk.

Can ducks take calcium tablets like chickens?

I think I've seen a liquid version. You could mix some into wet mash if you have many who need it.

 

[JacinLarkwell]

Can ducks take calcium tablets like chickens?

I'm not sure. I have 12 girls right now though, that all need calcium, and hand rlwrestling each one every day just isn't feasible

I think I've seen a liquid version. You could mix some into wet mash if you have many who need it.

I'll have to look for that. I can certainly make a mash for them to eat.

 

[JacinLarkwell]

Going to hopefully cull some more males this weekend. I think I have 5 left, and then a handful of females too that I need to just do

 

[Adorae]

What about black solider fly larvae? Those are suppose to be pretty high in calcium.

 

[NanaK]

I'm not sure. I have 12 girls right now though, that all need calcium, and hand rlwrestling each one every day just isn't feasible

I'll have to look for that. I can certainly make a mash for them to eat.

If you don't find the liquid version, I would think you could crush the tablet form and dissolve or sprinkle it in a mash too.

 

[JacinLarkwell]

What about black solider fly larvae? Those are suppose to be pretty high in calcium.

Way, way too expensive between the actual bugs and shipping. Plus it would throw off the rest of their diet if I just gave them a bunch of those

 

[NatJ]

What about black solider fly larvae? Those are suppose to be pretty high in calcium.

"High" depends on what you are comparing them to. They are not high enough to be useful in this case.

Compared with a layer feed meant for chickens or ducks, they are not high enough to be useful.

https://www.mdpi.com/2075-4450/13/9/831
Here is one paper talking about the nutrients in them.
It says "calcium (Ca) is the most abundant and ranges from 1.2 g/kg to 35.7 g/kg."

If a layer feed is supposed to be 3% to 4% calcium, that would be 30 grams to 40 grams of calcium per kilogram of feed.

For the range of numbers in the black soldier fly larvae, the ones with the most calcium would provide enough calcium if the birds ate nothing else. For the other black soldier fly larvae in that range, even feeding them as the sole diet would leave laying hens or laying ducks with not enough calcium. So they would still need a calcium supplement.

Flock Raiser or chick starter tends to have about 1% calcium, which would be 10 grams per kilogram. Some of the black soldier fly larvae had even less than that.