Duck being picked on—pulling feathers

[Duckworth]

I think the ducks probably know what they need and that if I give them free choice about it, they will probably eat what they need. I had just stopped supplementing their basic feed to keep things simple for my son.

When the weather is warm enough to support flies, I hang one of those jar-like traps with the fly attractant on the outside of the duck pen. That gathers and traps most of the flies otherwise attracted to duck poop, along with every other fly in the neighborhood. The ducks grab those flies as they fly by. Spiders that venture within reach of those ducks don’t stand a chance. I didn’t think about how much that was adding to their diet and thus would be missing in the winter.

 

[Miss Lydia]

 

[Duckworth]

I really appreciate the information and the lively debate. The more I know about other people’s reasoning, the better I can reason myself and hopefully make more effective decisions. So thank you to everyone who contributed. I hope this conversation will be helpful to others who can add it to their knowledge banks and enable them to be more proactive than I have been.

 

[casportpony]

It's not always protein...

No, but it is probably the most common cause.

 

[Miss Lydia]

Well, Flipper will need protein to regrow her feathers, so I’ll make the cat food available to her and give greens to all of them along with their regular Flock Raiser/All Flock and see whether that improves things. Flipper is the smallest of the four and looks slightly different from them, but she has also always seemed to be their leader. All of the other ducks’ feathers are in great shape, so I was thinking this was a social issue until I saw one of the ducks eat a feather and realized that there were no loose feathers in the pen or house.

It’s been very icy this winter, which was treacherous when I had one arm strapped to my body and throwing my balance off. A fall and reinjury would have meant a shoulder replacement that I’m trying to put off for as long as possible, since I don’t want to outlive the artificial joint. My husband did fall down the back porch steps and we thought he’d broken his arm, but fortunately, it was just a huge bruise. I checked on the ducks regularly during those six weeks, but didn’t do all of the daily chores related to their care and was thinking about not getting hurt. I’ve only started feeling “normal” in the last week. I wish I had put the pieces together sooner. I would have written in here, sooner, but the symptoms of the problem started up about the same time as everything else that was put off during my recovery hit. It really bothers me to have not given our ducks everything they needed all the way along!

You did the best you could and nutrients can be replenished quite easily with tweaking their diet, so don’t feel bad. Hopefully soon they will all be back together and enjoying some better weather. Hope you continue to feel better and can get out and enjoy your ducks again without worry of falling. It can sure be treacherous outside inwinter with snow and ice on the ground.

 

[DuckyDonna]

Thanks for bringing that up. I haven’t this winter. Everything seemed fine before I had surgery and my focus was on getting through that. I counted on my husband and son to keep a good eye on things, but though they are good at maintaining things, they aren’t good at spotting problems. I have frozen peas and will thaw some and put them out for the ducks. Through the fall, I gave them everything that was in my vegetable garden that I knew wouldn’t harm them, but once I got hurt and the weather changed, I didn’t supplement their diet with greens because I didn’t have any coming out of the garden. We are now eating what I canned all summer. I didn’t even think about there being no scraps for the ducks! Oops!!

I don't know where you are, I'm assuming out west somewhere, but where I am we've some some small local Farmer's markets. I found one that will buy my duck eggs and they save me "scraps" for my duck that they're about the throw away. None of the bigger chain grocery stores around here will do that for you. Maybe you could find someting like that where you live.

 

[Duckworth]

I don't know where you are, I'm assuming out west somewhere, but where I am we've some some small local Farmer's markets. I found one that will buy my duck eggs and they save me "scraps" for my duck that they're about the throw away. None of the bigger chain grocery stores around here will do that for you. Maybe you could find someting like that where you live.

That’s a good idea, though not practical for our specific circumstances. I live in Nebraska and all of our local farmers’ markets close up over the winter. It’s too cold to have anything outdoors and most crops are dormant. I have only four ducks and my husband is allergic to chicken eggs, but not duck eggs, so we use our eggs and I prepare and freeze any that are extra

My ducks love Swiss chard, which I grow in my vegetable garden. (I grow about 80 percent of our produce in our yard and preserve it for year-round use.) They also like basil flowers, parsley, clover and a few other weeds and go berserk for tomatoes. I got a new dehydrator this fall, so next summer, I will dehydrate all of the unusable chard leaves and any other herbs and weeds the ducks really like so that I have a supply to float in their water to supplement their regular feed. We live in a city neighborhood, but we have a sunny yard and are also allowed to grow vegetables in our front yards here.

 

[Miss Lydia]

Growing veggies instead of grass that’s very cool?

 

[Duckworth]

I checked on the ducks again. They have eaten all of the peas and most of the cat food. That’s great and I’ll continue to provide both.

BUT, with Flipper in the crate, the duck house and pen suddenly have a whole bunch of loose feathers lying around that weren’t there this morning. All but the front of the crate is covered and the front of the crate is mostly taken up by water and food, so I don’t think these are Flipper’s feathers.

I can see how there would be a lag between the ducks getting more balanced nutrition and stopping the feather pulling, but seeing loose feathers all around came as a surprise. I guess I’ll stay the course and watch and wait to see what happens—unless there are reasons to take a different approach.

 

[casportpony]

I checked on the ducks again. They have eaten all of the peas and most of the cat food. That’s great and I’ll continue to provide both.

BUT, with Flipper in the crate, the duck house and pen suddenly have a whole bunch of loose feathers lying around that weren’t there this morning. All but the front of the crate is covered and the front of the crate is mostly taken up by water and food, so I don’t think these are Flipper’s feathers.

I can see how there would be a lag between the ducks getting more balanced nutrition and stopping the feather pulling, but seeing loose feathers all around came as a surprise. I guess I’ll stay the course and watch and wait to see what happens—unless there are reasons to take a different approach.

Is Flipper molting maybe? I had a few that molted really late this last year/this year.