deep litter method, water problem

[Amiga]

I have the water out in the veranda, where the floor is soil-hardware cloth-sand-sawdust. In the summer, they need cool water at night.

For winter, I have a heater that looks like a straightsided baking pan with a heating pad on the inside of the bottom. Turned so that the heating pad is on the inside, the steel water pan sits on top. It comes on when the temperature drops below 35.

No food or water in the house, where I use the deep litter method.

 

[Buttercup Chillin]

I have a duck house and a hen house. But if I forget and leave the duck house open when the hens are roaming, they go in and make a mess in the duck house.

When the hens aren't around the ducks don't make much of a mess with the water on the ground I keep in there for them. They use the water in the evenings and early mornings in the house. I feed and water them out in the yard morning and evening, before they go back in the Duck House. Only time I have a mess is when I have Ducklings and there is all kinds of food and water in there. But that is understandable and acceptable then, better there than in the house DH says.

Its probably your hens making the mess. Raise the duck waterer and try that. When I first got ducks I had their waterer raised, cause I didn;t know any better. They used it just fine. Not to high though, but high enough the hens don't kick bedding in. Actually I put my Drake and extra Duck in the hen house when there are Ducklings, and they eat and drink fine. But I also have a pan of water in the run for them.

I say separate houses or of the same house, depending on your set up. My chickens would kick bedding into a gravel section. Stall Mats, would they work with chickens?? I don't know anything about them, may have to check them out for winter. I have a feeling there will be ducklings again this winter.