My only concern about using just netting is would it be easy for a cat to scrape or cut through?
Hopefully, this isn't too dumb of a question, but do electrical fencing/wires have fire-causing potential? I'm not really familiar with them or how they work and it would be very close to the house.
I'm not sure if something like newspaper or trash or a branch would fall and get stuck on the wire, if that has potential to do anything bad.
I am trying to look up some aviary designs on the internet, but i really like parts of yours best. I would like to put a roof over mine though for protection from tree limbs and use pillars, but metal poles would be easier.
I am trying to look up as much information as i can right now on them, since we are supposed to hopefully meet with our prospective builder this weekend. I don't really know if he will have any ideas on building it. hopefully he will.
I checked out several threads in the main forum section, but a majority of them looked like they were for chickens and they were too short and small and a lot of them were triangular.
One question i have on cleaning is that it looks like when i put in the pool, I should line it with some rocks and large pebbles and sand, which i gather are to help soak up water when they come out from swimming.
I saw a few places mention that the ground for them could have either concrete or sand and gravel floors.
I think having it completely concrete would be too expensive and i would rather have something a little more natural for their feet, so i am leaning more towards sand and gravel, but do you think i should do the entire floor like that or should i just replant grass? or have grass on one end like the left side which will get most of the sun and then the pool kind of in the middle and then have rocks and sand around that and to the right i figured i could make that their resting/nesting area?
Looking at your pics it looks like you have a lot of grass, but i just fear mine would die out if i had it on the right half side of the space alloted. I was thinking splitting it 50/50 would be the best alternative.
If sand is ok, is there any kind you might recommend as well as the rocks or gravel. I think my book or maybe Mallard Lane recommended "river gravel." I am guessing that is a type of gravel, maybe polished and/or rounded.
Speaking of sand, something i just read in the book i bought yesterday and read on another website that i did not know was that it mentioned that ducks should be supplied with coarse grit or sand of some sort to aid in food digestion. Would that be correct and if so, do their foods come premixed with that or is that something i would need to buy separately? I was thinking maybe that depends on their diet as well. I would think duck pellets might be softer, but again, this is quite new to me.
If i build a roof, I don't think the grass would grow very well and eventually die out.
The funny thing about all of this is my little sister was given an "easter duck" for easter when we went to a huge family easter party on someone's farmland and we kept it for about a year and then released it back on their farm, but i have no earthly clue how we took care of it. I remember my dad built a raised cage for it, but that was it. I don't recall what we fed it. All i remember is it got really big and brown and we had some gigantic 4 or 5 foot styrofoam ice chest cooler that it would dive into and out of after we filled it up with water.
Thanks for any replies in advance!
EDIT:
Ok, the building guy is coming out tomorrow and hopefully we can do some brainstorming.
We went to Lowes and Home Depot a few minutes ago and we saw 2 pond liners. We plan to go back and pick one of them up tomorrow. I'm going to start ripping out all of the bushes as well, so hopefully the land can be mostly cleared tomorrow.
I think i am going to go ahead and try to do something like yours 1lpoock, so that means I won't be doing a roof with shingles. It only gets partial sun as it is, so i guess it might be a good idea to just do without the shingled roof. I couldn't find any angled or curved metal fencing poles at either store. I just saw a couple of straight ones. I may have to go looking elsewhere and maybe i can do a search online and see if there are sites that sells stuff specifically for this. For the netting, all we saw was the plastic and metal fencing, so i am going to just order some from that 3t place.
EDIT 2:
Ok, we picked up the little duck pond as can be seen here:
The builder recommended doing the following:
wire bottom in the ground, rocks on top of that for drainage, a few inches of sand on top of that.
A pressure treated frame with cemented posts.
For the sight barrier, we were going to copy our fence and use a "rotboard" (his words) and then do some small fencing tops all around to make up the needed height. I forgot whether it will be on top or in front of the base board.
Chicken wire around the sides and top.
I ordered the 1" 12.5x50 heavy notted 3t netting and will put it on the top a few inches below the ceiling.
The dimensions are still in the same ballpark of 6' x 13' x 7'. I think we actually somehow got to 5 feet across, but i think that is just not large enough. I have about 7 feet to work with and i would feel much better with 6 feet.
I am thinking of maybe putting a weed blocking sheet at the very bottom below the wire or right above it, but i'm not really sure if that is necessary.
We will probably get started on the building of it in the next few weeks. Next week is Draft week, so for sure it won't be started until the week after.
I took out all of the landscaping from the area as well. It didn't take as long as i thought. Only about an hour, but i decided to transplant half of the bushes to the front yard, which recieves a lot more sun and the plants up front didn't hold up too well in full sun. Then i moved the rest around to the neighbors house. Also dumped all the mulch and little dirt next door too. That helped out quite a bit, so the area is more or less prepared for the guy to come work on it and isaved him some time having to clearing it out. The aftermath of all that took an extra 2 hours. At least it wasn't 100 degrees outside!
Using the sand, from what i saw from a few other threads will allow the ducks to use the grit on their own without having to be supplied it by me in the trough i guess, although i still may do that.
In either case, do ducks just know when to eat it with their food or how does that work? Do they just eat a little of it separately?
Next up, I will probably buy a watering device and look into buying 2 or 3 nesting boxes and then think about what i will do on the ground level. I think i will make a little roofed box area like 1lpoock did, although i saw several people mention they used little dog igloos.
