Chickens, Ducks, Food n Water

[pixie74943]

Okay.. so, lets see if I can say this in plain english.

I want to get 4-6ish chickens, and 2 ducks, and would rather house them all together. I know that ducks need to drink while they are eating, and get water everywhere. And wet mouldy food is bad for chickens and ducks. But I like having a gravity feeder for the chickens that I only have to fill once or twice a week. But if I had ducks, they would get the food wet and mouldy in that time :-(

So I was thinking, If I had my water source a reasonable distance from the food, the ducks would have to waddle back and forth and wouldnt be able to get the food wet... right?? The only problem is if the food and water are too far away from each other, would the ducks have trouble eating?? I'd rather use a gravity feeder thingo than have to make 3 or 4 trips a day outside to make sure the birds always have plenty of food, since it wouldnt be a good idea to have too much out in the morning and make a mess everywhere, and waste the food instead of eating it.

 

[chickboss]

You could try it. My ducks are five weeks old now and it seems that if the food and water are a couple of feet apart the mess isn't too bad. As far as sharing food, I don't know if the extra Niacin that the ducks would need is bad for chickens. I can't imagine that some brewer's yeast or something like that mixed with the food to meet that need would be bad for chickens, but you never know. Might want to check it out.

 

[Amiga]

I agree you should be careful about the niacin situation. Too much can be as bad as too little, and too little niacin for ducklings can have serious consequences.

How important is it to you to keep your present management methods, like the gravity feeder? Ducks mean many adjustments, for those with chickens as well as those of us raising them (their needs change, their behaviors can be very challenging and result in the need for changes to housing, feeding, watering, and who knows what).

It might be less stressful for you to wait about ducks until you are comfortable with the idea of doing things quite differently.