My Love Affair With Ducks...

[WannaBeHillBilly]

I have told you over and over why.....

dux are evil!

Confused your mind by the dark side is!

Away you must stay from xickens bewitching.

 

[WannaBeHillBilly]

Don’t cha now! That is my grandson’s Paw Patrol bucket that I snatched.

Funny story. That cage was purchased many years ago for one of our little heelers. It has been used for many things over the past 7-8 years, but the past 2 years it has served me well as a broody breaker. I added a 1/2” hardware cloth bottom to it and set it up on 4x4’s to keep it off the ground to allow air to pass underneath. I told myself last Saturday afternoon that as soon as I take it out of the chicken run I would have another broody pop up. And I was partially right...I had TWO broodies pop up. Dad gum birds!

At the moment i must evict up to five ducks every day from their nests. What a commotion: The ducks are quacking, drakes are rasping, even the crows are yelling at me.

 

[WannaBeHillBilly]

So, I was out there refilling the pool a little earlier and hurried and started videoing once I saw Ralphie was gonna whip out his dangling participle! Poor Petey, she ain’t nothing but a surfboard.

Haha!

It doesn't look to me as if she had many objections, though…

 

[WannaBeHillBilly]

I would, but my luck with lottery tickets is about as good as my luck with trying to hatch out pullets. It sucks!!!!!

Wait, when you try hatching out ducks! - The last two years were the years of the drakes, just ask @Magnolia Ducks and @Texag87 . I was just lucky with Katharina last year, three drakes and four girls. After that

 

[WannaBeHillBilly]

My sweet baby drake went from being 1. glued to my ankle to 2. running out in front of me, like he wanted to lead the way to 3. charging at me but not doing anything once he got to me to 4. Full blown malicious raptor that has a passion for human flesh. It was awful until he got sick, then became my sweet little cuddle bug again. BUT NOW he’s better so back to jeans and boots the rest of the mating season Seems like there are different levels of aggressiveness in the males so hopefully your Ralphie doesn’t get past #3!

Maybe i just look too intimidating, but other than standing tall in front of me and rasping, none of my drakes has even tried to bite me. On the contrary, i'm the master of the cat-food and they know that if they look cute…

 

[WannaBeHillBilly]

I set my duckie alarm to 9 am. This is the ducks’ new time of being released from their house.

Today there was NO egg, but I had already let them out of their house. Well, my little sidekick had. But they are still in their run. Worst case scenario I guess is another egg in their pool I can fish for.

My question is, do ducks actually lay an egg every single day? I would have thought that NO they don’t, but since they are strict about laying between the early morning hours I just wasn’t sure.

Maybe this is the schedule: they lay Egg #1 at 4 am on Day #1, then Egg #2 at 6 am on Day #2, then Egg #3 at 8 am on Day #3, then skip Day #4 altogether. Up until today she had laid an egg on four consecutive days.

I’m just curious.

They usually lay one egg per day in the morning during the daylight-season, except for…

1. They (think they) are broody
2. They have ducklings
3. Their name is Blanca Duck, in which case they sometimes lay two eggs a day.
4. They are in a hard molt.
5. Their name is Katharina Duck, who sometimes lays her egg in the evening.

When the days are getting shorter, they still lay eggs, but not daily, so out of 24 ducks i still got 12-14 eggs every day.
Your ducks are beginners in the egg-laying business, they just need some time to adjust and find their pace and rhythm.

 

[WannaBeHillBilly]

Dux are devious and evil. They will hold their egg until the most inconvenient time and place to drop them.

Think of them as a toddler before a long road trip that refuses to go to the bathroom. They will only need to go when it’s impossible to find a place to stop.

Actually, my studies on this subject show dux taught toddlers how to be obstinate.

I heart that those »dux« in fact were xickens who learned a foreign language and disguised themselves as dux!

 

[WannaBeHillBilly]

They are very cognitive, but they use their “abilities” to sow evil and discord. Other than Ralphie Dux who have a highly developed sense of good and evil and fight evil at all costs.

Think of dux as ANTIFA with feathers.

So according to your theory, Ralphie Dux are the ANTI-ANTIFA?

 

[duluthralphie]

So according to your theory, Ralphie Dux are the ANTI-ANTIFA?

This is true.

 

[Mimi13]

At the moment i must evict up to five ducks every day from their nests. What a commotion: The ducks are quacking, drakes are rasping, even the crows are yelling at me.

I wonder if you treat broody ducks the same way you treat broody (chicken) hens?