Raising ducklings...

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AbundantAcres

AbundantAcres

In the Brooder
9 Years
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Okay, so this is our first go-round w/ducklings. lol We've got 16 Khaki Campbells who just arrived today... my question is regarding them and their water. I did the whole 4 drinks, remove for half hour, repeat for 2 hours thing and then let them have the water free choice. It's a 1 quart standard waterer and I put some rocks in so that they can't make a total mess. (yeah, sure! lol) So I leave for half an hour and in that time they've managed to all get themselves damp. If they were chicks they'd be dead. They aren't soaking wet, just damp to the point that they are shaking their feathers off. They don't seem to be any worse for wear, but nothing I've read addresses this. Are they okay to be getting themselves wet from the waterer? Obviously they can't swim in it, but man, they get some in their beaks and then just shake their heads until it flies everywhere.
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Thanks in advance for the info!!!

Ann Marie

Living the crazy country life w/DH, 7 goats and 5 goat kids, 34 chickens, 5 cats, 2 dogs, 116 chicks, and 16 Khaki Campbell ducklings. This is the life!
 
I have raised too many to count and have never had them die from getting damp
After a few days they can go swimming
They are not like chicks at all
Good luck and hope they grow big for you
And yes they are nasty little critters lol
 
Our 1st go with ducklings we learned alot. We had 11 in a brooder. We let them have water 24/7. They did have a heat lamp. Well overnight 1 was completely soaked and could not get dry and warm and died over night. We now know over night to take both food and water and return it to them in the am. Good luck with your ducklings, they are so much fun, though so messy....
 
Here's what I do with duckling waterer: Take an empty Cool Whip container (the photo shows cottage cheese, but it got too small after the first week and I graduated them to a Cool Whip tub), cut a slice out of the lid and put the lid back on. The ducklings can dip their heads into it, as they need to clear their nostrils, but there's a whole lot less water being flung around. And they can't get their whole bodies into it.

41679_duklingwaterer.jpg
 
Quote:
I'd like to know how you get this to work. I tried this recently with 3 pekin ducklings we just got, but they still made a mess and soon we able to tip the container over. (now they are over 2 weeks old and they are huge!) Seems too light for them. Maybe it was just because they are Pekins?
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Use a gallon jug. Cut a hole in the side, just big enough for their heads, and at the height of their backs. Put it in a broiler pan or pie tin.

Never had one tip one over, and they make much less mess.
 
I appreciate all the waterer ideas! I think that the gallon one would work for us, but with 16 ducklings who all try to drink at once I'm not sure how that would go over w/them? Maybe a couple holes instead of just one??? And then I need to change the waterer as they get bigger right?

And just as an aside, do everyone's ducklings get all wet and make a mess like this? I'm only concerned w/them being wet. As it turns out they were fine w/just a 60 watt bulb in their brooder until they got wet, then they started to hover. Got a 100 watt instead and will try that. The 250 that I put in was way too much, they wanted OUT! lol So this should be a happy medium.
 
Ducks simply are messy, and particularly messy with water.

As my two grew, I actually got a bigger plastic tub... like the kind you buy generic ice cream in? Or cookie dough? And then I put a rock in the bottom of it; no more tipping it over.

For outside, I found an old plastic Alhambra water bottle, the kind that holds 7 gallons of water. I used a hole bit to cut out a hole on two sides of it. (Overlapped the hole saw drill bit so it cut out a larger hole made of many holes.)

The holes on each side are pretty wide, and tall enough for the ducks to put their whole heads into the bottle. The holes themselves are about half way up the side of the Alhambra bottle.

It's easy to dump the icky water out, and easy to fill it with fresh water, but the ducks can't tip the bottle over OR get anything other than their heads into it.
 

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