Dirty Water

[ClickerChick]

Lizzie (my duck) loves to get the drinking water muddy with all of her hole drilling and dabbling in the mud. I continuously have to clean the water - how can I keep the water clean for the chickens? I put the drinker on a couple bricks to keep it from getting dirty from their feet, but it doesn't help at all with Lizzie's drilling. Suggestions?

Thanks!

 

[redsoxs]

I had the same trouble with my ducks and their kiddie pool. What I finally did was build a rectangular enclosure around the pool and fill the enclosure with gravel. Now whatever sloshing or overflow happens the water just goes into the gravel. No more bore holes or muddy pool!

 

[ClickerChick]

Ooh, good idea! I'll have to try it!

But what if she goes outside the gravel and drills, then comes back and drinks from it? Well, I guess we don't have a solution to everything except fill the entire pen with gravel... Nah... Silly critters!

Thanks!

 

[JudiBinSC]

I have 2 silver appleyard girls (13 wks old) who have a great pool surrounded by river rocks that we had left over from a project. This really helped keep the pool cleaner but I still change the water every couple of days. What I found that helps is to put a water basin out where the pool is drained to and the ducks tend to play in there. That way they clean off in the water basin, which is a large black rubber feed dish.
I'll be adding my 9 other silver appleyards (5 wks old) to the flock soon so most likely I will be adding another swimming pool to their area. We have a pond on our property that eventually they will own, once it is totally surrounded with high tension wire fencing around the boarded bottom....I'm hoping to get more people interested in this breed...Silver Applyards are great ducks! I will be breeding and selling them in the future.

 

[Deleted member 94844]

The only thing to do is minimize the mud... your ducks and their water will stay much cleaner! Gravel is definitely a way to go, we have mostly gravel and rocks around our pond. Get tumbled if you can, tho. Not emptying pools into grass is another way to minimize the mess they make. We drain the pond into a raised garden the ducks can't reach so plants get watered and no muddy ducks. I also mulch planting beds they have access to with orchid bark which discourages somewhat from drilling in the dirt. They will occasionally go after something and get a dirty bill, but not enough to soil their water.

 

[Miss Lydia]

We used 12 bags of river rock with landscaping fabric underneath. Then we put the large Kiddie pool on top, it's been up and running for close to a month, drains great and no mud. We're on the side of a mountain so finding flat ground to work with is near to impossible, so we had to use landscaping timbers and do a bit of excavating.

 

[ClickerChick]

Great ideas everyone! I'll see what I can do.

The crazy duck has drilled a hole about six inches deep, and 2 inches diameter! XD she's crazy, but I love her!