Mallard ducks

[Glennmm]

Hi. We are new to duck raising. Our reason for choosing Mallard ducks was to enjoy watching them on our 1 acre pond. Question: once our 2 young Mallards are grown and we release them on the pond do we try to coop them at night?
We know our baby khaki Campbell's will be egg producers and need the protection of a coop, just confused about Mallards. Thank you!

 

[sourland]

They will be vulnerable to predation especially if the pond freezes in the winter. It would be best to have them 'pen trained'.

 

[Glennmm]

They will be vulnerable to predation especially if the pond freezes in the winter. It would be best to have them 'pen trained'.

Thank you for your insight. We thought so. We are training them with the khakis now so we will keep doing what we are doing. We live on the GA coast so the pond freezing won't be an issue, but snakes and racoons definitely will!

 

[Table4Six]

Mallards, even domesticated ones, have wild instinct in them, but it would be best to have them join a flock with other none flying domestic ducks. This will help them be more willing to be, as @sourland said, 'pen trained' during the night.