Knighstar679
Crowing
I have an existing "building" on the property I live that I want to turn into a duck house. It is a hoop house that originally housed rabbits about 4 years ago by the prior owner. Rabbits seem pretty tasty to me just like ducks could at least in the view of any predator I could picture. So i am hoping that maybe with a little insight by some other people that I can maybe figure out how to make this and my duck pen idea work easiest with out spending a lot of money.
Here is the view of the front part of the hoop (duck) house
I still have some clean up left to do but the property goes back to the tree line so i have lots of room to start with.
Here is a bit of the inside, I realized too late that it was too dark to get good inside pictures but these were ok. It gives an idea of what it looks like.
I am going to be getting HVAC tape to fix the insulation that is in the ceiling so that won't be a problem. The rest of the crap will be cleared out by the time the ducklings hatch. So here is what I found out today in my poking around. There is a big rectangle box under this structure that is lined with a type of gardening plastic, and on top of that is about three inches of fine gravel. The ventilation is poor so I have plans to cut some in the tops of the wooden panels at the ends which each house doors.
Around this building I can not see any signs that there were predators that tried to get in ie no holes dug in and there is no holes in the tarp. So could this building as is be ok to house my ducks for a while until I get settled in and can do more to make this a ducky heaven? If not what would I absolutely need to do before they homed in it?
Next thing on the list is a ducky pen. This is a must. I really want this even done before the inside of the Duck House is done.
This is my oh so professional plan for my duck pen
. I plan on doing this as inexpensively as possible. Case in point I am going to make the main structure of it out of pallets. They should be able to stand up to the most harden animal throwing their weight into it and still stand.
I have plans to do a 16 by 18 or 20 foot area in a soft sandy like stone I just found I could get for free at a local stone place if I live in the town I do. So that takes care of a cost there. That leaves me with predator proofing and what has to be done right off and what I could do in small bits as money allows.
I do know I have hawks in the area so I was going to do bird netting over the top of this to protect them. The only ground predator I have seen is a single cat and my own cat has chased him away. My cat doesn't go after birds (being scared by an African grey at 8 weeks old kinda takes birds off the menu).
I could really use some advice on this part of my planning process. Thanks!
Here is the view of the front part of the hoop (duck) house
I still have some clean up left to do but the property goes back to the tree line so i have lots of room to start with.
Here is a bit of the inside, I realized too late that it was too dark to get good inside pictures but these were ok. It gives an idea of what it looks like.
I am going to be getting HVAC tape to fix the insulation that is in the ceiling so that won't be a problem. The rest of the crap will be cleared out by the time the ducklings hatch. So here is what I found out today in my poking around. There is a big rectangle box under this structure that is lined with a type of gardening plastic, and on top of that is about three inches of fine gravel. The ventilation is poor so I have plans to cut some in the tops of the wooden panels at the ends which each house doors.
Around this building I can not see any signs that there were predators that tried to get in ie no holes dug in and there is no holes in the tarp. So could this building as is be ok to house my ducks for a while until I get settled in and can do more to make this a ducky heaven? If not what would I absolutely need to do before they homed in it?
Next thing on the list is a ducky pen. This is a must. I really want this even done before the inside of the Duck House is done.
This is my oh so professional plan for my duck pen
. I plan on doing this as inexpensively as possible. Case in point I am going to make the main structure of it out of pallets. They should be able to stand up to the most harden animal throwing their weight into it and still stand. I have plans to do a 16 by 18 or 20 foot area in a soft sandy like stone I just found I could get for free at a local stone place if I live in the town I do. So that takes care of a cost there. That leaves me with predator proofing and what has to be done right off and what I could do in small bits as money allows.
I do know I have hawks in the area so I was going to do bird netting over the top of this to protect them. The only ground predator I have seen is a single cat and my own cat has chased him away. My cat doesn't go after birds (being scared by an African grey at 8 weeks old kinda takes birds off the menu).
I could really use some advice on this part of my planning process. Thanks!
