Okay, I need some helpful hints from you wonderful duck experts. My husband and I are the ones who asked for suggestions about do-it-yourself enclosures for ducks and now we have our actual ducklings and ideas. My hubby works better under pressure and when he knows the ducklings won't move outside until he builds their house, it will get built. lol
We chose muscovy because that is what we would like to eat and cayuga because we wanted another breed with a different color egg that laid more eggs for me as I'm allergic to my wonderful delicious chicken eggs, and cayuga is what was available (and they sure look pretty!). We don't think the muscovy are particularly attractive so I was a sucker for a pretty face. So now we will have two differing needs in our ducks. The area we have chosen is well drained and is surrounded by trees but is open. We have a large tree stump we cannot remove from the spot so I thought to create a muscovy nesting area there.
We have a small seasonal pond planned by using a horse trough sized container, and an open igloo like structure planned to house them with a door to slide shut at night. Will the muscovy want roosting areas like the chickens? and the cayuga on the floor? How do you keep the eggs from getting all full of poo if they don't use a nesting box? Can cayuga get into something off the ground to swim? I had planned on forgoing the pond for the coldest months of the year here (when it freezes, etc.) but will that be unhealthy for the cayuga? Would a muscovy drake create babies with a cayuga female? I have especially large muscovy supposedly.
If you have either breed I'd love to hear what works for you, or if you have both together I'd like to hear how they are doing together. Our plan is to have a muscovy drake, two or three muscovy hens, and the two cayuga hens. We want to have parent muscovy raise muscovy only, use the these cayuga as friends who lay eggs so I can collect those all the time to eat and leave the muscovy for duckling production. At this point I actually have 13 straight run muscovy to choose from and just the two cayuga hens who are my definite keepers.
Suggestions welcome! I'm a total duck newbie here. I'm thinking the muscovy will need their wings clipped in my environment (forest). But I especially love hearing what will NOT work so we don't make too many mistakes.
We chose muscovy because that is what we would like to eat and cayuga because we wanted another breed with a different color egg that laid more eggs for me as I'm allergic to my wonderful delicious chicken eggs, and cayuga is what was available (and they sure look pretty!). We don't think the muscovy are particularly attractive so I was a sucker for a pretty face. So now we will have two differing needs in our ducks. The area we have chosen is well drained and is surrounded by trees but is open. We have a large tree stump we cannot remove from the spot so I thought to create a muscovy nesting area there.
We have a small seasonal pond planned by using a horse trough sized container, and an open igloo like structure planned to house them with a door to slide shut at night. Will the muscovy want roosting areas like the chickens? and the cayuga on the floor? How do you keep the eggs from getting all full of poo if they don't use a nesting box? Can cayuga get into something off the ground to swim? I had planned on forgoing the pond for the coldest months of the year here (when it freezes, etc.) but will that be unhealthy for the cayuga? Would a muscovy drake create babies with a cayuga female? I have especially large muscovy supposedly.
If you have either breed I'd love to hear what works for you, or if you have both together I'd like to hear how they are doing together. Our plan is to have a muscovy drake, two or three muscovy hens, and the two cayuga hens. We want to have parent muscovy raise muscovy only, use the these cayuga as friends who lay eggs so I can collect those all the time to eat and leave the muscovy for duckling production. At this point I actually have 13 straight run muscovy to choose from and just the two cayuga hens who are my definite keepers.
Suggestions welcome! I'm a total duck newbie here. I'm thinking the muscovy will need their wings clipped in my environment (forest). But I especially love hearing what will NOT work so we don't make too many mistakes.
