Duck walk/entryway?

[Forest_Nymph]

I'd like some info on building a walkway for ducks to enter my coop. (width, heighth, depth) I have (hopefully) new ducklings coming this month. I'm in the process of redesigning our chicken run with an option of sectioning off the run into 2 separate areas. 1 for the chickens and 1 for a pair of ducks to include a waterering hole. (or can they run together?)
My query is about building that ramp access and I need to know how wide or how steep can it be?
These ducks will be either calls or small runner ducks. My small chickens do fine with their ramps... Will ducks have more or different problems?
Currently, the chicken ramp is 55 inches long and attached to the chicken door at 27 inches above the ground level.
Will this be sufficient for the ducks? Will a 6 inch board be wide enough?
They will be living in the coop together yet separated with chicken wire.
Hope these questions find an answer!!!

yours truly,
Sylvia

 

[SandraChick]

good questions....

Ducks wil bully the chickens...so unless you have enough space, I suggest separating the run...

I have runner ducks...I have a chicken style door that comes down and is a ramp with some horizontal slats on them. At first, it was too hard for them to go up it (it's steep)...so I stapled a rubbery mat (shelf liner)right over the slats; it's like a bunch of poofy rubbery squares so there's a lot of little holes too...

anyway...that made it so their feet would "stick" to the ramp.

I did have to teach them to use the ramp...took about a week of catching them and "walking them up" into the coop. Those ducks had never seen a ramp where they came from!

The ramp into their pool is a 6' 1X12- no need for rubber mat on that one.


Good Luck
Sandra

 

[Picco]

I would suggest making the ramp wider and extend it out so its not as steep. Ducks aren't as agile as chickens on land. Chicken doors are also a bit small for them, they prefer a wider door because unlike chickens they will all try to get in the door at the same time and things can get a bit chaotic. The set up you have now with the door and ramp seem alright but it might take a while for them to get used to it. Making their coop comfortable is really important because ducks prefer to sleep outside so if its difficult for them to go in they might be less likely to do so and this makes them more suseptible to predation.

 

[Forest_Nymph]

Thanks for the info, guys! I will take into consideration all that you've said and work with it.

Thanks again

Sylvia

 

[chicken boy sam]

I've heard that chicken-type doors would worrk just fine.