duck foodz - switching my mallard to mazuri waterfowl maintenance feed

[mara DuckMom]

Hi everyone, I have an approx. 5 month old male mallard and since he was about 9 weeks old he has been eating a duck maintainer feed (17% protein) and its been working great, however it's ridiculously expensive...$40 for 10 lbs, and I have to order it online which has caused a few issues. I've seen rave reviews of mazuri waterfowl feeds, which are also sold at local feed stores, so I recently picked up a bag of mazuri waterfowl maintenance feed (14% protein) and i'm gradually mixing more and more of the mazuri into his usual feed to make the transition. I'm switching him over because I feel it will be better to have him on a slightly lower protein content since he's about full grown now, and its MUCH cheaper than the feed he was on before.

My problem is, his current feed is very ground up with larger bits of corn kernels in it so he's used to a pretty fine food and the mazuri is in kibbles that are a lot bigger...I've noticed that he's been pushing a lot of the kibbles fully out of his food bowl. Do you guys think I should just be grinding the mazuri up for now and gradually give him bigger pieces of it or what? I've been throwing some in his pool too and he seems interested at first but doesn't appear to eat any, at least while I'm watching...maybe once they soften up more in the water he does.

Any hints, tips or suggestions would be appreciated! thanks!

 

[Amiga]

I think you have good ideas there.

First, give the food a good sniff test and make sure it does not seem at all moldy. Sometimes ducks will refuse to eat moldy food.

If the food seems fine and fresh, yes, I would either grind or chop it up a bit, or even moisten it - just be sure that leftover food more than a day old (some would say even 12 hours) is discarded, again to be sure there is no mold.

Slow change makes sense to me - that is how I have switched feeds in the past. Sometimes the ducks just don't like the change at first.

Moistening food has worked well for us.

Then there is fermented feed. You can look that up also.

 

[mara DuckMom]

thank you for your reply! I've given the new food a good sniff and had a few others do the same just to be sure, I didn't smell anything foul seeming, hopefully the duck isn't sensing something i'm not..

it was really easy to switch him from his starter feed to the first maintainer, they had very similar texture and color so he probably couldn't even tell which was which, this mazuri on the other hand looks very different, maybe he's just confused as to why there are weird little brown pieces in his food now

I crunched some of the mazuri up into smaller bits and mixed that in the new dish of food I gave him for the evening, i'll have to check out the damage tomorrow and see if he indulged at all. i'll probably try soaking some of the food for a little bit too before putting it in his pool so its softer.

thanks again for your insight, much appreciated!

 

[Amiga]

I tried Mazuri with my flock, and they were a bit wary of it at first, also. Then a few of my runners were having calcium deficiency symptoms so I switched over to a different brand, a layer feed that was recommended by a friend.

 

[mara DuckMom]

do you know if calcium deficiency is a common problem from this feed? I think I remember noticing the calcium levels were a little low..i'm definitely gonna research to see other people's experiences with it and what symptoms I might see..are there any early key symptoms I should keep an eye out for??

 

[Amiga]

In our case I don't think it was the feed. I need to constantly fiddle with their diet and occasionally need to give just one duck extra calcium. Free choice oyster shell, calcium gluconate solution and prescription Neocalglucon have all been used here.

 

[CelticOaksFarm]

mazuri makes a breeder/layer as well as starter

 

[Amiga]

mazuri makes a breeder/layer as well as starter

Right. Part of my fiddling with feed is availability. The feed store that carries Mazuri only carries maintenance, and they are over an hour's drive away, to a part of the state I rarely visit.

And another feed store stopped carrying the feed I was using. Another one closed and moved farther away. It's a moving target.

Nice to "see" you, CelticOaksFarm.

 

[Going Quackers]

Right. Part of my fiddling with feed is availability. The feed store that carries Mazuri only carries maintenance, and they are over an hour's drive away, to a part of the state I rarely visit.

And another feed store stopped carrying the feed I was using. Another one closed and moved farther away. It's a moving target.

Your not alone, it can be quite hard to get certain feeds much less for some of us to get much in variety, i am not in the US so that complicates things even more, we simply don't get the same brands even if we do formulas are not the same often.

 

[Amiga]

Your not alone, it can be quite hard to get certain feeds much less for some of us to get much in variety, i am not in the US so that complicates things even more, we simply don't get the same brands even if we do formulas are not the same often.

Yes, GQ, we saw quite a bit when we were sharing on the thread about the aflatoxin concern in duck feed, remember? Wow.