how do i convince my parents to let me get a duckling?

[JacinLarkwell]

At this point, it would probably be best to put the want on hold, get a job (if you don't have one) and start saving so you have money to begin renting or getting a down payment together for some property that you can pen some day.

I also really, really want ducks again (we had Swedish and Perkins years ago). My family says no, and it is their property, so I have to be content with what they so allow me to raise and just dream about what I will get duckwise when I have my own space. Personally I'm thinking musvovies, silkied and hookbills

 

[Pierre duck drake]

Here's my pekin!

 

[ducklover4ever]

I think you are in love with the **idea** of ducks. Fueled by no small amount of nostalgia.

I have ducks. and chickens. and goats. soon, rabbits.

Ducks are:
Loud, obnoxious, DIRTY MESSY DISGUSTING eaters, sometimes aggressive (even to humans), unreliable layers, and expensive to maintain.

Why do I have them??? Fast growing dark meat for the table. Also, they make a good beef substitute in sausages or ground as burgers.

Your parents have said no, no small number of times, and offered reason. Perhaps tongue in cheek, when another parent offered some examples of less than reliable teenager behaviors, you suggested they resembled yourself. Your existing animals, unlike ducks, are all very low maintenance, with limited space requirements. Moreover, as a teen, in just a few years, you are looking (most likely) towards college or trade school - some place where you can't bring your ducks. So your current want commits your parents to years of maintaining "your" duck, after you are (likely) gone from the household.

Welcome to BYC. Put your ducky desires on hold, enjoy ducks vicariously through our flocks, continue to educate yourself about them, and have you considered an avian veterinary career??? Plenty of cat and dog vets, very few we find with decent knowledge of poultry and waterfowl.

This bowl of water had been changed maybe 10 min before this picture was taken. (some of my Pekin hens)
View attachment 2936684

i feel like you just degraded me a lil but but ok :, )
um yeah im aware they said no. I still have time untill i go to college, BUT my neighbor loves barn animals and has everything except ducks. goats, horses, chickens, pigs, sheep, you name it. And she said if i got ducks, when I leave for college she can take them untill i come back and see them whenever I vist.
i know i odnt know a lot but I feel like i am going to learn a lot more on this website

 

[DickMidnight]

@NatJ ans @U_Stormcrow have covered things pretty well for you here. it’s really good advice.

are you my mom- because you just said some very detailed things abt what i forget to do-

and you just pretty much proved their points.

 

[U_Stormcrow]

i feel like you just degraded me a lil but but ok :, )
um yeah im aware they said no. I still have time untill i go to college, BUT my neighbor loves barn animals and has everything except ducks. goats, horses, chickens, pigs, sheep, you name it. And she said if i got ducks, when I leave for college she can take them untill i come back and see them whenever I vist.
i know i odnt know a lot but I feel like i am going to learn a lot more on this website

I merely offered a perspective - and am not famed for my empathy, though I make honest effort to help those who honestly seek to learn and benefit from their time here, on those few areas where my knowledge and experience might be useful. Best you think of me as the occasionally useful curmudgeon. Sometimes informative and/or entertaining in small quantity.

The word, btw, is Denigrated. Synonymous with Disparage. Alternatively, Demean.

But I understood what you were trying to communicate. For what its worth, you read into my tone a message not present in my writing to you. I merely communicated information - if you feel a "no" and associated reasons are, somehow, an "attack upon your person" (notwithstanding your revelation that your parents suggested you were unreliable) you might be thinking more emotionally than intellectually. In my experience, that is not a reliable basis for wise decision making. For what its worth.

My advice is worth no more, and perhaps less, than you paid for it.

 

[raingarden]

Have you planned out your duck brooder, your duck pen and duck pond? How much space will it have?

 

[ducklover4ever]

im really not sure thats what i came on this website for-

 

[DickMidnight]

im really not sure thats what i came on this website for-

what you hoped to accomplish on here was honestly an impossible task.

none of us has the power to change your parents’ minds. even if we did, no one is going to defy what your parents have already said.

you need to remember that you live in their house. i’m sure most, if not all, of the financial responsibility of your ducks will fall to them. not to mention what everyone has already said about the birds’ well being becoming your parents’ headache if you fail to take care of them.

hopefully your neighbor gets ducks sometime soon and you can visit them often.

 

[U_Stormcrow]

Have you considered a job, even part time, then simply buy a couple ducks FOR YOUR NEIGHBOR, with her permission? Keep her in food, and help with the duck's maintenance (and the other animals).

In that way, you have most of the benefit of the ducks, and demonstrate some responsibility to the parents as well. With none of the long term commitment concerns.

...as a free suggestion.

 

[DickMidnight]

Have you considered a job, even part time, then simply buy a couple ducks FOR YOUR NEIGHBOR, with her permission? Keep her in food, and help with the duck's maintenance (and the other animals).

In that way, you have most of the benefit of the ducks, and demonstrate some responsibility to the parents as well. With none of the long term commitment concerns.

...as a free suggestion.

i’m seeing the neighbor as a happy compromise here as well, as long as they’re ok with an arrangement of that sort.