How much ducks actually eat?

[Ducktown]

Here's a question. I've been experimenting with different grains and poultry feeds and watched my 5 indian runner ducks (2 drakes and 3 hens) forage. What I learned is, that they won't eat slugs (or anything) if I feed them 20% protein poultry feed. Well, they do snap at bug from time to time, but much less likely than when I feed them grains. They forage a lot, but they just nibble at weeds and grass, it doesn't seem they eat anything at all.
If I gave them oats with 25% commercial feed, they ate anything alive that came along, ate greens in large quantities and liked to nibble on treats.
Wheat, wheat millrun,.. A lot less foraging than with oats. They do eat greens and consume small amounts of slugs and insects they can find.
I am giving them corn that is almost ripe (already has hard kernels, but they can be easily broken) and they seem to like them. I didn't find out yet how much proteins they will need and how much greens they will consume, because I'm still feeding them corn with wheat grains, so they all get used to the new food. They were foraging all the time, but they left snails, slugs and even grasshoppers alone. Now and then, they snapped at flying insects. It seems they had enough.

I gave them corn, because it is getting cold in the morning (+9°C) and daily highs remained somewhat low. Tomorrow, daily highs will reach 30°C again, and I'll switch back to wheat. Cooler weather and good amount of rain made slugs to leave their hideouts and there are plenty! I noticed that despite feeding them just wheat grain, they won't touch slugs if they eat a lot of them day before. They just start to roam around, searching for grass seeds and they eat much less.

I was thinking about giving them less feed, but I'm afraid they will starve. They have all the greens they can eat available and a lot of slugs and bugs. Could I try leaving them search for their own food and when they come to get some from me - can I give them greens instead of grain. By greens I mean radicchio and similar dark green and red winter lettuce stuff. I offer them poultry feed every couple of days to make sure they get all the vitamins and nutrients if there's any that lacks when they forage.

 

[MillersFarm]

they should be eating grubs all day, Just maybe when you're not looking. I have a khaki campbell pair that we never feed.. literally! They forage all day and sleep outside, They're basically wild except for that they always stay in our property. I would feed them between 12:30 and 2:30 when its the hottest part of the day and they dont feel like foraging much. In the morning is when all the grubs are out so you want them to eat those first before you feed them, We have over 40 chickens and 20 ducks and only feed them two cans a day since they're all free ranged.

 

[Ducktown]

Then I definitely feed them too much.
I'll try leaving them outside in the morning before I feed them. Well, now after the rain, they often go search for food rather than hit their feeding bowls.. I'll see how it goes that way. I'm sure it won't be possible for them to starve, they get extremely loud and annoying if they get hungry.

 

[jofanx]

I have muscovies and I only feed them at night when I close them in their pen. Not free choice so they work on clearing my property of pests and weeds during the day. At night, if I give them any more than half a cup of feed per duck, it gets left until the morning (or trampled into mud on the ground.)

 

[Ducktown]

They like greens more than they like anything else now. Their droppings are also dark green slime kind of crap. They demand feed early in the morning when I let them out, but then they don't need to eat until dusk. I didn't give them any grain tonight, just lettuce and slugs. They have eaten the green treats and let the slugs go. Next days we'll get hit by another heat wave which means there will be much less slugs, snails and other creatures they used to eat for at least 14 days. They will suddenly feel like eating living food.

 

[AquaDuck]

I just want to say that this was very informative and food for thought. Both your experiments with different foods vs foraging and the replies.
I'm on my first year raising a number of muscovy ducklings (12 weeks now, not babies anymore), and food rations is something I'm always considering. They forage some, but also just sits around a lot. I too are concerned about feeding them too little and therefore starving them. Will now try to have more faith in their foraging abilities by cutting down the chicken feed mix ration during daytime.