Gardening with ducks??

[chicken farmer]

Does anyone use ducks as garden helpers?? I'm gonna fence in my garden and some yard and section it off so once my plants in the garden grow some I can let the ducks in and they will eat the weeds,snails,slugs,bugs,and be fertilizing it at the same time. I have never raised ducks but I'm gonna really soon and have them be my little garden helpers/buddies,and I have a wild mallard duck egg in the incubator due May 5th and I'm gonna buy a couple indian runner ducklings from a local person that is selling them or go to Tractor Supply and buy some white pekin ducklings so the mallard duckling has buddies of it's own kind and I want some for my garden. Does anyone else garden with ducks or anything like this?? If so I would love to hear about what you do and post pictures if you have any thanks!!!!

 

[ducks14]

Yes! They are great at it! I have a farm and all of my ducks and geese are free range but they go up in a house at night. I haven't had a tick in my yard for three yrs. this forum is amazing for issues or to learn new things. Just remember everything is a predator to any waterfowl. Raccoons, bobcats, fox, stray dog, ect. I got mallards from tractor supply three yrs ago. I have 36 birds now. They are amazing pets and not hard to keep and are smart!!! When you get them spend every minute you can for the first six weeks with them. They will imprint on you. My mallards fly with me when I run across the yard. I let them out around 9 am and put them up at sundown. Owls will hunt at dusk and dawn. They like ducks! I rescue ducks and have new rescue geese. These are the only ones I have had issues health wise with. If you keep your ducks in a clean place, worm them twice a yr. and keep predators at bay you are good to go!

 

[mariehanson]

I was really quite surprised how easy it was to train my ducks to be my gardening helpers. They now just need to see me with a gardening trowel or fork and they will run around my feet and get in the way. Anything I dig up, their little beaks are in the hole looking for bugs and worms. They free range in my garden all day and are like little vacuum cleaners cleaning away bugs all day long. I would say that they do think that anything you plant is for them to eat or dig up, I have replanted my summer flower bulbs three times already as they keep digging them up, it must be a game for them.