Duck house out of brick?

[Kmoreau]

I am renovating my house and we took down and interior brick wall. we have a lot of extra brick. I am going to be building my duck pen, by next month. We are putting in up a wrought iron fence around it, and were thinking about what kind of house we could build. I had the idea to build it using the extra brick. Square, 3x3 with a removable roof and a slab floor. I think it would be cute cause it will perfectly match my house, and will be practical to rise out and be warm for the winter.

Does this sound like a) enough room for sleeping, nesting and feeding, for 2 ducks, b) does this seem safe for the ducks, and c) I was thinking about painting the interior with dry lock to help as a mosture barrier, but would this be safe for ducks?

Thanks in advance

 

[dianaross77]

I guess my only concerns would be ventilation and light. I suppose you could suspend the roof on rafters and use hardware cloth to close the gaps. You could roof it with clear or translucent plastic roofing to let in light. It sounds like it will big enough.

 

[Kmoreau]

Oh I see your point about ventilation and light, I was going to build a rather large opening for the entrance, so I think that would provide a good source of both, and they wouldn't get locked in that, just the pen. ( which will be, 6x8) and during the day will free range my backyard. So I don't think light should be as big of an issue.

 

[dianaross77]

Oh I see. Like a 3 sided shelter for horses and such. That should be fine then.

 

[mangus580]

You could also leave a 'patterned' gap in the bricks as you lay them, allowing ventilation there as well. you could even 'brick' the hardware cloth into those gaps as you build.

 

[grawg]

I would also be careful about a clear or semi-transparent plastic roof on a structure like that. Just picturing that in my head and it seems awful close to what one would build for a cold frame or a greenhouse. Depending on how you build the roof, you could always hardware cloth in the gables.

 

[ChickInDelight]

oh - that sounds too cute. Do post pictures as you build. I totally agree about ventilation!!!

If it is three-sided, and they can go in and out as they like, build it to suit yourself. Likely, they will never use it anyway.