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- #21
Here's an update after living with ducks for three weeks. It doesn't sound like much but it's a lot when they are your first.
We have 6 Khaki Campbells running around in a 10% of an acre enclosure. From what I've read this is actually quite right (60 ducks per acre). Most of it is an older orchard with fully grown apple, plum, walnut and pawpaw trees where there's also the water pump and the duck house. Almost closed canopy, very good protection from birds of prey. Some of the area is the new orchard-to-be with younger trees.
We place buckets and little basins of water randomly inside the duck enclosure so that wherever they go, there's some water nearby. Or sometimes we specifically want them to go to a certain corner of the area so we place the buckets more densely there which works just fine.
The duck area has a wire mesh fence that's about 4 ft high. That's enough because it's not like they are actively trying to escape. They kinda fly but they get about a foot of the ground. Wherever there is water and food they want to stay. The fence is more to prevent our younger dog from getting ideas and ducks from randomly wandering in places of our property where we really don't want them because of recently sown grass, bad visibility from the house etc.
They are not laying yet (will start in a month or so). They get around 3 oz dry weight of a barley - corn - oats - buckwheat equal weight mixture per duck per day and they are happy with that (ie. they stop loudly notifying us that more grain is required). The difference to the standard 6 oz or so is, I guess, covered by hunting for greens and critters in the orchard. This definitely works because on rainy days when the hunting is plentiful, the demand for grain is very noticeably lower.
We live in a village; we have our own buckwheat and oats and everybody grows barley and corn. When the ducks start laying I'll probably buy the laying feed in concentrate form to be mixed with the grain. It seems a waste not to use the food that's easily available. It is very clear that the ducks prefer corn above all else but they do eat almost everything by the end of the day. We serve the grain fermented or, when in a hurry, at least soaked.
In the morning around 6 AM I let them out of their house; in the future I plan to install an automatic door with a timer so that if I should happen to oversleep (once in a blue moon) they don't go thirsty and hungry. At this time I normally also change all the water in the various buckets basins etc and offer the smaller morning round of grain. I can see that they are happy with the fresh water when they start bobbing their heads and necks and splashing around.
Then it's a full day of hunt - wash bill/head - hunt - ..... take a nap ... repeat ... and so on until 5 PM or so when the duck alarm triggers at goose sound level: WHERE'S THE GRAIN DUDE?? - so I come in to deliver the larger afternoon-evening part of the daily serving of grain.
Sometime after 8 PM at dusk I visit them again to gently guide / shoo them into their house. They don't go in by themselves but the process is very much improved since I placed another length of the mesh wire in a way that creates an about 20 ft long funnel, 15 wide ft at the entrance and ending in a place where the only place you can still go is the duck house entrance ramp.
They definitely do need to be in the house at night since there are foxes, weasels etc around. The bedding is straw (barley, wheat etc). No food or water in the house to avoid a mess.
So ... that's the first 2 weeks. I will start thinking that maybe I know something about living with ducks this time next year when we will have tested out all the seasons, especially winter. But maybe it will be like with bees where I keep thinking "maybe by the time I'm 90 I will have some certainty".
We have 6 Khaki Campbells running around in a 10% of an acre enclosure. From what I've read this is actually quite right (60 ducks per acre). Most of it is an older orchard with fully grown apple, plum, walnut and pawpaw trees where there's also the water pump and the duck house. Almost closed canopy, very good protection from birds of prey. Some of the area is the new orchard-to-be with younger trees.
We place buckets and little basins of water randomly inside the duck enclosure so that wherever they go, there's some water nearby. Or sometimes we specifically want them to go to a certain corner of the area so we place the buckets more densely there which works just fine.
The duck area has a wire mesh fence that's about 4 ft high. That's enough because it's not like they are actively trying to escape. They kinda fly but they get about a foot of the ground. Wherever there is water and food they want to stay. The fence is more to prevent our younger dog from getting ideas and ducks from randomly wandering in places of our property where we really don't want them because of recently sown grass, bad visibility from the house etc.
They are not laying yet (will start in a month or so). They get around 3 oz dry weight of a barley - corn - oats - buckwheat equal weight mixture per duck per day and they are happy with that (ie. they stop loudly notifying us that more grain is required). The difference to the standard 6 oz or so is, I guess, covered by hunting for greens and critters in the orchard. This definitely works because on rainy days when the hunting is plentiful, the demand for grain is very noticeably lower.
We live in a village; we have our own buckwheat and oats and everybody grows barley and corn. When the ducks start laying I'll probably buy the laying feed in concentrate form to be mixed with the grain. It seems a waste not to use the food that's easily available. It is very clear that the ducks prefer corn above all else but they do eat almost everything by the end of the day. We serve the grain fermented or, when in a hurry, at least soaked.
In the morning around 6 AM I let them out of their house; in the future I plan to install an automatic door with a timer so that if I should happen to oversleep (once in a blue moon) they don't go thirsty and hungry. At this time I normally also change all the water in the various buckets basins etc and offer the smaller morning round of grain. I can see that they are happy with the fresh water when they start bobbing their heads and necks and splashing around.
Then it's a full day of hunt - wash bill/head - hunt - ..... take a nap ... repeat ... and so on until 5 PM or so when the duck alarm triggers at goose sound level: WHERE'S THE GRAIN DUDE?? - so I come in to deliver the larger afternoon-evening part of the daily serving of grain.
Sometime after 8 PM at dusk I visit them again to gently guide / shoo them into their house. They don't go in by themselves but the process is very much improved since I placed another length of the mesh wire in a way that creates an about 20 ft long funnel, 15 wide ft at the entrance and ending in a place where the only place you can still go is the duck house entrance ramp.
They definitely do need to be in the house at night since there are foxes, weasels etc around. The bedding is straw (barley, wheat etc). No food or water in the house to avoid a mess.
So ... that's the first 2 weeks. I will start thinking that maybe I know something about living with ducks this time next year when we will have tested out all the seasons, especially winter. But maybe it will be like with bees where I keep thinking "maybe by the time I'm 90 I will have some certainty".
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