Help, my ducks are all Drakes

[Dixieldy]

Hello yall- I for some reason all along thought my ducks were going to be females. Well, no such luck! All Drakes with the curly feather I have 13 chickens and I started off wanting just chickens but my kid and grand kid wanted ducks so I got them without knowing much. The problem is, my drakes want to mate with my poor hens. I have no roosters as I personally didn't want fertile eggs to eat. So now I am wondering what to do with the ducks. It takes time for ducks to grow and if I got more, hoping they would be females would the big ducks hurt them as they grew? I dont know what options I have. I had hoped for some eggs. I love the ducks but I'm going to have to put them in a run of their own now. So here are my ducks.. I know one is a Peking and a Mallard, but I also dont know what my gray one is. The gray one is the one messing with the chickens. What would you do? Thank you all for the help.

Sonja
Dixieldy

 

[PirateGirl]

Unfortunately drakes can be quite amorous. Also their anatomy is different than that of a rooster and they can seriously injure or kill a chicken by trying to mate it. I would separate the ducks from the chickens if you wish to keep them all. Some people have success with all drake flocks, but sometimes (especially in mating season) there is still quite a bit of drama. It may be possible for them all to range together in a larger area, especially outside of mating season. I have recently found my ducks and chickens can all play nice in a large enough space but when they are in/near their houses and nesting areas they get quite upset.

 

[Duckworth]

Getting a few female ducks is unlikely to solve your problem, either. You would need many more duck hens to balance out three drakes. And ducklings of any gender would need to be protected from the drakes until they are grown up enough to protect themselves.

 

[PirateGirl]

Oh yes, I meant to mention that as well, ducklings would need to be separate from the drakes and the chickens until they are full grown and close to sexually mature, maybe 4 months old.

 

[DuckyBabies]

I would definitely separate the ducks from the chickens. I have a drake flock consisting of 2. They get along really well, I have only had to separate them once for about a week. I tried to add a new drake in, and my boys weren’t happy about it. If you were gonna get enough hens for your three drakes, you would need about 2-3 hens per drake. If you want to keep ducks and want eggs, maybe sell off your drakes and buy adult females, or keep one drake and buy him some adult ladies to be with him.

 

[Going Quackers]

They are cute the mystery duck looks to have a bit of runner in it but after that you got me, cute though!

Anyways as the owner of a drake flock now... separate the ducks from the chickens, if your happy with the ducks as they are, don't bother with trying to find females it can be a frustrating and drawn out thing... (speaking from experience here)

If you do want proper ratios as said at least 2-3 per drake is best... definitely a case of the more the better but that is really up to what you want to take on. The drakes will be fine as a trio...

 

[Dixieldy]

Thank you all so much. For now, the ducks are in the chicken tractor which is super large and the chickens are free ranging until I can get the tuna built. Thanks so much, I will probably keep them but when is mating season over already? Does it last long? Want to hear.something funny? Those crazy ducks Charge at us. I laugh because I don't know what they think they are gonna do hahaha.

 

[Miss Lydia]

Hormones run amuck.

 

[Dixieldy]

Hahaha isn't that the truth though. By chance do you have a suggestion on what I can feed them? I had them spoiled on green beans, corn and crumbles but now that I wint be getting eggs from them I need to feed them something else as my flock is on organic feed. Thanks for the help!

 

[Miss Lydia]

Organic feed is great for them. And for snacks all the other things you mentioned unless your feeding layer.