Duck Addicts Anonymous (DAA)

[Quatie]

Is it just me or does Lylah always have this look like she's thinking, "I'm surrounded by idiots....."?
View attachment 2980918
Maybe it's just me.... When I took this picture they were extremely worried about my "feather" quality and couldn't get over the fact that I let my head feathers get in this mess. They go crazy over long hair (especially coarse curly locks), shoe strings and the thing that creates the most insanity, hoodie strings!!!

Such a cutie! My ducks only attack my hair when they are ducklings. They are so above that once they get older .

 

[MangoDuck]

Hello all! Before we begin, ask yourself these vital questions:
Have you ever used ducks to self medicate? Have you ever tried to quit adding ducks and failed? Have you searched for ducks at hours on end? Do loved ones tell you that you have too many ducks? Do you spend a majority of your day thinking about ducks and adding more? Have you ever broken the law to obtain ducks? Have you ever experienced withdrawal symptoms when attempting to stop adding ducks?
If you answered yes to any of the above questions see below:
This thread is for those of you, such as myself, that find themselves battling the never ending addiction to ducks. My journey started with 4 ducks and has led me to 21. I like many others find myself obsessing over ducks and constantly adding more. Welcome to Duck Addicts Anymous (not to be confused with Drug Addicts Anonymous).

Duck Addicts Anonymous is a three step program focused on helping you overcome your dangerous duck addiction.

Step 1: Count your ducks. (If you have over 15, you might want to admit you have a problem)

Step 2: We admit we are powerless to the ducks and that the ducks have taken over our lives.

Step 3: We give up because the ducks are too darn cute to resist and the temptation is too much to bear! Might as well build a bigger duck pen.

If you have gotten to step 3, you have realized that the compulsion to add more ducks is just too great. What’s one (or two, or three or four) more anyway…


This leads us to my story.

The root of my duck addiction goes back to my childhood where we raised jumbo Pekins growing up. My personal duck addiction started back in 2010 with pekin ducklings. I had these ducks a very short time due to a sudden move. After this, I was unable to get the idea of ducks out of my head. A few years back I added 4 ducks to my little homestead. Sadly I lost my original flock to a predator; however, I was able to salvage their eggs (from the fridge) and hatch three miracle ducklings. I currently have one duck left from that hatch. I added a rescue drake (crested Rouen mix). Last year I added 7 call ducks. Since then that number has grown to 19 call ducks. I hatched most of them myself. Hatching itself is a whole other addiction but we won’t get into that…


I currently have pending purchases of a show quality call duck pair, and some quality black East Indies. I have 2 eggs due to hatch this week, at least a dozen saved, and I have a broody call sitting on a large clutch.

Feel free to share all your duck stories below! Meetings will commence on a weekly basis to see how many ducks are being added…
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Your ducks are really beautiful! Especially your hybrid runner/crested, and I think your call ducks are especially pretty.

I thought I would share my story of ducks too!
When I was 12 I rescued a mallard duckling who’s mom was really injured on her wing, and also unable to walk due to a broken leg, therefore unable to care for her duckling. I tried to help the mom but she wouldn’t let me get near her unfortunately, and I didn’t want to stress her out more than she already was. The baby was only a day old so he hadn’t really bonded with the mom yet, and he didn’t seem to mind the separation much. He was obviously scared, but once he realized we weren’t gonna hurt him, he didn’t mind us at all. I was able to raise the baby duck to adulthood and release him back at the lake where I found him! We checked up on him every few weeks, and he seemed to be doing well!

My family really missed our duck once we returned him, so we got four muscovy duck eggs and three hatched!
Unfortunately we had to move a few months later, so we returned the ducks to the person we got them from. When we moved, we got two pekin ducklings.
That was two years ago, and now I’m 15 and we still have the two ducks! Hoping to get a big flock of them when I’m an adult!

 

[Angel07]

Today I lost 2 beautiful ducks. While I was at school and the ducks were free ranging a fox came along and took 2. Of course the ducks were taken and not the drakes I'm having to cull . One of them was a young girl who would've been starting to lay soon. The second was the saddest. She was the mama duck who laid almost as much as chooks do. She has laid 2 clutches with 20 odd eggs in each, hatched out one of the clutches (11 ducklings hatched from her clutch and she looked after them all so well), laid all the other eggs I grabbed and was still laying. I don't know how she done it. She was my sister's favorite.

This is her and her 11 babies last year

Sorry, I'm a bit upset tonight. Thought you guys would understand. That's just the part of having animals I do not like.

 

[Painted Calls]

Is it just me or does Lylah always have this look like she's thinking, "I'm surrounded by idiots....."?
View attachment 2980918
Maybe it's just me.... When I took this picture they were extremely worried about my "feather" quality and couldn't get over the fact that I let my head feathers get in this mess. They go crazy over long hair (especially coarse curly locks), shoe strings and the thing that creates the most insanity, hoodie strings!!!

So precious!!!! Her little lower eyelid.

 

[Painted Calls]

Today I lost 2 beautiful ducks. While I was at school and the ducks were free ranging a fox came along and took 2. Of course the ducks were taken and not the drakes I'm having to cull . One of them was a young girl who would've been starting to lay soon. The second was the saddest. She was the mama duck who laid almost as much as chooks do. She has laid 2 clutches with 20 odd eggs in each, hatched out one of the clutches (11 ducklings hatched from her clutch and she looked after them all so well), laid all the other eggs I grabbed and was still laying. I don't know how she done it. She was my sister's favorite.

This is her and her 11 babies last yearView attachment 2980991
Sorry, I'm a bit upset tonight. Thought you guys would understand. That's just the part of having animals I do not like.

 

[Silkie Princess]

Am I the only one that always has a story of some kind going with any pictures? This happened the other day. I usually dump and fill pools in the morning, but they'll usually play in yesterday's pool water while I'm letting the other chickens and ducks out for the day. Obviously I didn't check the weather and everyone had frozen water. The temps were going up quickly so I didn't think there'd be any problems....... I came back to change their water and found this.

Paisley and Tulley: What the heck is going on here? This isn't normal.
View attachment 2980861
Lylah: Morning Mom, do you see this dumb dumb?
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Faith: Well, sh*t! I wasn't expecting this..... Anybody going help me or am I going to freeze my weebies off?
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Yes, I admit that I need a life outside of my ducks and chickens

That chocolate duck is stuning!

 

[Quatie]

Today I lost 2 beautiful ducks. While I was at school and the ducks were free ranging a fox came along and took 2. Of course the ducks were taken and not the drakes I'm having to cull . One of them was a young girl who would've been starting to lay soon. The second was the saddest. She was the mama duck who laid almost as much as chooks do. She has laid 2 clutches with 20 odd eggs in each, hatched out one of the clutches (11 ducklings hatched from her clutch and she looked after them all so well), laid all the other eggs I grabbed and was still laying. I don't know how she done it. She was my sister's favorite.

This is her and her 11 babies last yearView attachment 2980991
Sorry, I'm a bit upset tonight. Thought you guys would understand. That's just the part of having animals I do not like.

So sorry to hear. She was a beautiful duck

 

[HeatherKellyB]

That chocolate duck is stuning!

Thank you. I've got to get a good solid roof for them in their new run. They are so faded and bleached by the sun. I just hate that. Thankfully they don't really care, but it really bugs me. They actually seek out the sunniest (?) spots they can find. It's crazy looking back at pictures before this started. Their colors are so nice and bright

 

[HeatherKellyB]

Today I lost 2 beautiful ducks. While I was at school and the ducks were free ranging a fox came along and took 2. Of course the ducks were taken and not the drakes I'm having to cull . One of them was a young girl who would've been starting to lay soon. The second was the saddest. She was the mama duck who laid almost as much as chooks do. She has laid 2 clutches with 20 odd eggs in each, hatched out one of the clutches (11 ducklings hatched from her clutch and she looked after them all so well), laid all the other eggs I grabbed and was still laying. I don't know how she done it. She was my sister's favorite.

This is her and her 11 babies last yearView attachment 2980991
Sorry, I'm a bit upset tonight. Thought you guys would understand. That's just the part of having animals I do not like.

I'm so sorry. It seems like it's always the favorite or the sweetest that stuff like this happens to. Thank you for sharing them with us

 

[WVduckchick]

These silly ducks flew up on to my stack of firewood on the front porch. It’s stacked about 4’ high.