Any advice for a pet duck newbie?

[Naliez]

Hello! I have a small, mixed flock of very friendly, socialized chickens that we hatched ourselves. We live in an urban area with a big, fenced in yard and good neighbors. We want to add a couple ducks so, I ordered a small number of Ancona duck eggs to hatch. Ducks will be a pretty new experience for us. I had bought two runners YEARS ago, that were a couple weeks old when we got them and both ended up being drakes. Honestly, they were terrible. Very unfriendly and aggressive to each other and everything else. I don't know if it was the breed, or the fact that they were both boys, or what, but they left a bad taste for ducks for us. I'd like to try again, now that we have a little more experience in raising fowl and we have a better set up as well. I'm also hoping that Anconas might be a better breed of duck for us and hatching them ourselves will give us an opportunity to bond with them right away. Any advice you guys have to give would be very much appreciated! Thanks!

 

[Amiga]

Welcome to the duck forum!

Ducks can be great to have - and there are some that seem to have personality disorders!

They are different than chickens, from what I have heard, in some significant ways.

You might look over the Breed pages - the Mallard page was just put up today. https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/1073858/duck-breed-focus-mallard#post_16394682

There is a sticky for raising ducklings, too.

The Duck Thread is full of everything duck, so you can poke around there and see what's what.

I don't have chickens, but I can tell you that ducks have a special relationship with water, and if you manage for that, things are pretty good.

Predators will come out of nowhere for ducks. In a few cases, people who have had chickens noticed more predators after they got ducks.

I enjoy my Runner girls, my Buffs, BEI and my Buff drake.