How soon can they move outside?

[Amiga]

Baby ducks in the wild are generally not hatched in New England in February (like mine were - that is a story in itself), have mothers to warm and oil them, and often don't make it to adulthood.

 

[chickboss]

I'm in Oregon, the temps have varried a bunch here, but I'd say this week are hovering high 30's to the 40's at night. My Kahkis are 5 weeks and were outside for the first time without a heat lamp in their house last night. I checked on them A LOT, and everytime they were sleeping and barely touching, nothing close to the "help we're cold" huddle I was expecting. I think putting them out at this time depends on how often you want to check on them to be sure they are not out there suffering in the cold. Mine seem good. Will be checking on them often tonight as well.

 

[savingdogs]

I'm in WA state probably close to you chickboss, but I am at a high altitude so I think I'm going to need to bring them in, at least for another week or so. I hope that "hardens them off" as we would say with a plant, getting acclimated to colder temps. They should be growing more feathers in too, I would expect.

I didn't realize I could take away the water in the middle of the night and have been stressing that they run out of water while we are sleeing. I'm really relieved to know you could take the waterer out of the brooder over night at all. Good to know!

 

[chickboss]

Savingdogs~ Hey another Pacific Northwestrener......! LOL, I don't think I spelled that right. We are probably a bit warmer down here, I am down south in Douglas County. We are at about 1200-1500 ft, elevation wise. Weather has been CRAZY this year. We didn't have any snow at house level, just in the higher hills, until March. And then we got some. So weird. It has been cold, hot, cold, hot. Pretty mild so far this week, no frost for a few days. I checked the calander, and my ducks will be 6 weeks old tomarrow, so it sounds like they are a bit older than yours as well. We did lots of outside play time during the day before we let them stay out at night also. I like the plant analogy,

that's kind of how I see it to.

 

[savingdogs]

We are bringing them in right now....they looked all huddled together. I think we need more shelter for them outside before they can do an overnighter. They don't seem to like their shelter so we need to revise it a bit first.

We are at 1700 feet but we've had crazy weather this year too. The first day I took them outside it was sunny and warm and then suddenly started to hail on them! I felt pretty stupid.

 

[RedfogsFlock]

We live in AZ outside of town so it gets down to the low 50's at night and hot during the day. We put our baby runners out when they were one week old, and that was two weeks ago. We just made an old dog house into a brooder a while back, so they get to go in there at night. We have a 100 watt bulb in a silver clamp on light inside and that keeps them warm. Hope this helps you a little!

 

[chickboss]

Savingdogs~ LOL, don't feel stupid. Same thing happened to me about a week and a half ago!

Redfrogsflock~ I would kill for night time temps in the 50's now! I'm jealous!

 

[ChristinaMae]

My babies are just a day or two shy of 6 weeks. I started putting them outside mid-day every day so I could change their brooder at around 4 weeks - and then they immediately went back into the brooder and inside. One of the days the weather was awful - rain, really cold, windy, was probably mid-high 30's, but felt colder due to the wind. I couldn't catch them to get them back in. I was getting soaked, my fingers were numb, I got mad and said, "Screw it!" and went back inside to warm myself up and dry off. 10 minutes later it started raining buckets, large gusts of wind, light hail, I grabbed my coat, threw my shoes on, yanked the front door open, and hollered, "I bet you're regretting not coming in now, huh?!" Only to see them all taking a nice swim in their little kiddie pool having the time of their lives. From then on they've been outside free-ranging from 9am until dusk, they still get brought into the house at night. I just took their light away at night, and we don't heat the house at night. I'm pretty confindent they'll be ready for outside full time by the end of the week - hopefully we'll have their premanent house and run built by then. I might run a light out there anyway, just incase, but they're pretty hardy little guys.

I didn't realize I could take away their food and water at night. This would really help with the mess.

 

[Cowgrl4life]

I guess this begs the question for me, I have a place they can go outside, a box that i've pretty much made a brooder with a heat lamp and everything, but this would also mean they would be out with my other chicks and the only problem I see with that as thats the plan for when they are older, is that my chicks are on medicated chick starter and I hear that they are not not NOT supposed to have it. IS it possible they could go out there even though they would be getting chick starter? If not.. I'm not sure what I'll do because my chicks will be on it for quite awhile longer and I dont have a separate enclosure for the ducks.

 

[FenDruadin]

My 16 Holderread ducklings are six days old today, plus one that I hatched myself a couple days later. I've never raised so many at once before, so I didn't realize how inadequate my rubbermaid brooder would be. Two nights ago, when I woke up, they were SOPPING wet and cold, even with two brood lamps. One has a gimpy leg and she had been unable to escape the wet and looked like a drowned puppy. It took her a couple hours wrapped in a towel sleeping under a very hot brood lamp before she could even lift her head.

I decided they'd be better off outdoors, where they have a large wire-floored brooder made out of an old rabbit hutch. It has plywood walls on three sides and hardware wire on the front. I put two 60-watt brood lamps against the back wall where it's sheltered by two plywood walls, and laid straw thick on the floor to prevent drafts coming up through the wire.

I planned to check on them every two hours. However, I had a rough night and ended up sleeping through my alarms. I woke up in a panic this morning, envisioning hypothermic ducklings breathing their last. The temperature outdoors was 43 F. I knew at least that Little Bit, the lame one, would be dead.

I threw on my robe and my barn shoes and ran out to the brooder. As I approached, I saw them in two heaps under the brood lamps, limp and quiet. But as I approached, one popped up her head, then two more, and before I knew it, they were all looking around and cheeping good morning. Even Little Bit was there, cozy in a pile, half-asleep but alert.

They weren't even uncomfortable.

Now. I'm not suggesting everyone run out and put their week-old babies outside in the cold, obviously. I'm just saying that apparently, I've been coddling them way too much! lol

So, that's my experience, for what it's worth. I do agree, though, that at least the first few nights or when it's going to be very cold, it's a really good idea to go check on them every couple hours, just in case--for one thing, electricity can cut out or brood lamps can burn out, and then you're in trouble.