DIY brooder... Look ok??

[Miss Lydia]

Until your duckling are not eating snacks they don’t need grit. Once you start giving out treats then put a small bowl of chick grit for your ducklings close to their feed they’ll eat it as needed. They need to know the difference between grit and feed so they don’t over do on the grit.

 

[Ratchnick]

Don't forget to turn on the heat lamp for about a day before the ducklings go in so that the bedding ect gets up to temperature.

 

[gtaus]

View attachment 1974155 Here's the current set up. We'll probably use the hook my jacket is on to keep from having to put another hook in the ceiling

I think that setup will be fine. Given the small size of the box, I would either angle the heat lamp into a corner and/or provide a covered area like you mentioned. Chicks need heat, but they also need the ability to move away from the heat lamp if it gets too hot for them. I used my thermometer to measure the temp under the light - and - also the temp in my cool zone.

A safety chain for the heat lamp does not have to come from the ceiling. I just made sure that my heat lamps would not fall on the ground if it was somehow knocked off the clamp in the middle of the night. All the more important to think about those potential fire hazards if you are brooding your ducklings in the house.

And the disposable pee pads are genius. I wish I would’ve thought of that before getting messy shavings lol

Ducklings are really wet and messy compared to baby chicks. I have used newspaper, shredded newspaper, and pine shavings for my ducklings in the brooder. No matter what I used, I ended up cleaning the brooder out everyday (I had 10 ducklings). If disposable pee pads work for you, that's great. I ended up using the pine shavings because I would compost them for the garden after use.

This year, for my baby chicks, I used a deep litter of wood chips. I started out with about 3 inches on day one, stirred up and/or added chips to cover droppings and wet spots over the following weeks, and at the end of the 8 weeks in my brooder the deep wood chip litter was about 6 inches deep. For me, the deep litter of wood chips was a great success because I never had to clean out my brooder, there was no smell from the chicken poo because it was stirred up in the wood chips (all I could smell was the wood chips themselves - which I liked), and when I finally moved my chicks to the big coop, I dumped all those wood chips from the brooder into my compost bin.

That was a big success for me and I will be using that method forward. Having said that, ducklings are much more wet and messy compared to chicks, so I can't say deep litter wood chips in a brooder would work as well with them. It might, and I just mention it in case anyone else reading your thread has tried it. I suspect if you invested in an incubator that you might be brooding ducklings more than one time.

Can't wait to see your ducklings in the brooder. Please post some pictures if you can. Also would love to hear what you use for brooder bedding and what worked best for you. Take care.

 

[gtaus]

Until your duckling are not eating snacks they don’t need grit. Once you start giving out treats then put a small bowl of chick grit for your ducklings close to their feed they’ll eat it as needed. They need to know the difference between grit and feed so they don’t over do on the grit.

I defer to the BYC educator on this point. However, I was told that chicks sometimes eat their bedding (pine shavings, for example), so it was necessary to provide grit from the start. I know chick starter does not need grit, but if OP uses pine shavings for bedding, would you be concerned about the possibility of a duckling eating some shavings and get blocked up? I really don't know. However, I always had grit available to the ducklings from day one and I never lost a duckling. So that is the method I always went with in the brooder.

 

[Duckfarmer1]

Yes baby duckies love their water! That looks like a good kind of set up. I just had a thin container and drilled holes in for drainage and it worked a treat with the water. They weren't too bad with their crumble. Depending where you are you may be able to find a real duckling starter mix, sometimes they just take extra searching. Looks like you have a great little set up

You could always just buy niacin in the powdered form off Amazon...that’s what I just did, and then you’ll have in the future for all the ducks in need of a boost!. Make sure to show pictures!

 

[Miss Lydia]

I defer to the BYC educator on this point. However, I was told that chicks sometimes eat their bedding (pine shavings, for example), so it was necessary to provide grit from the start. I know chick starter does not need grit, but if OP uses pine shavings for bedding, would you be concerned about the possibility of a duckling eating some shavings and get blocked up? I really don't know. However, I always had grit available to the ducklings from day one and I never lost a duckling. So that is the method I always went with in the brooder.

I think it’s best for first week or two not to have the ducklings on shavings because of possibly eating since they are just learning what food,is I read the op and shaving but it went right over my head. I use pee pads and also good used towels work great over shavings or just used on their own. Once they learn what’s to eat an what’s not shavings are fine. As well as grit.

 

[JillZaHulk]

Until your duckling are not eating snacks they don’t need grit. Once you start giving out treats then put a small bowl of chick grit for your ducklings close to their feed they’ll eat it as needed. They need to know the difference between grit and feed so they don’t over do on the grit.

That's good to know. I never really knew how to do the grit. Even with the grown ducks. I usually just sprinkle a little on their food but maybe I should do a separate dish.

 

[Miss Lydia]

Most everyone who has had ducks for a while will say put grit and oyster shell in separate bowls they will use as needed. Oyster shell of course if you have layers.

 

[aart]

Tho I've never had ducklings, but I've had plenty of chicklings.
One thing that caught my eye here is that you could probably remove the lamp shade guard and set the lamp shade right on the top of kennel. Also being inside the house you don't need a heat bulb, a 100W red incandescent reptile bulb will be plenty.....with a dimmer extension cord to adjust heat out put.

For chicks, but might give you some tips:
Here's my notes on chick heat, hope something in there might help:

They need to be pretty warm(~85-90F on the brooder floor right under the lamp and 10-20 degrees cooler at the other end of brooder) for the first day or two, especially if they have been shipped, until they get to eating, drinking and moving around well. But after that it's best to keep them as cool as possible for optimal feather growth and quicker acclimation to outside temps. A lot of chick illnesses are attributed to too warm of a brooder. I do think it's a good idea to use a thermometer on the floor of the brooder to check the temps, especially when new at brooding, later I still use it but more out of curiosity than need.

The best indicator of heat levels is to watch their behavior:
-If they are huddled/piled up right under the lamp and cheeping very loudly, they are too cold.
-If they are spread out on the absolute edges of the brooder as far from the lamp as possible, panting and/or cheeping very loudly, they are too hot.
-If they sleep around the edge of the lamp calmly just next to each other and spend time running all around the brooder they are juuuust right!

The lamp is best at one end of the brooder with food/water at the other cooler end of the brooder, so they can get away from the heat or be under it as needed. Wattage of 'heat' bulb depends on size of brooder and ambient temperature of room brooder is in. Regular incandescent bulbs can be used, you might not need a 'heat bulb'. If you do use a heat bulb make sure it's specifically for poultry, some heat bulbs for food have teflon coatings that can kill birds. You can get red colored incandescent bulbs at a reptile supply source. A dimmer extension cord is an excellent way to adjust the output of the bulb to change the heat without changing the height of the lamp.


Or you could go with a heat plate, commercially made or DIY: http://www.backyardchickens.com/a/pseudo-brooder-heater-plate

 

[JillZaHulk]

I'll catch up in a bit but I wanted to share... One is starting it's venture out to the big wide world. There is one that's a day older who I would've thought would've been ready yesterday... But then again there's a possibility that the older eggs could be mixed Pekin with pekin, Mallard or khaki...