Not sure if new ducks are eating?

[Allysha1990]

I recently got given 2 ducks (a call duck and a call duck/mallard cross). They are both fairly timid and are a lot smaller than the 2 Muscovy crosses that I have and my 10 chickens. The chickens don't bother them too much and the Muscovys are starting to get more friendly, but I am just worried that my 2 girls arn't getting all the feed they need?
They get chased away from the food quite a bit because they are the smallest and the lowest on the pecking order, however I try to compensate by leaving little piles of food in the areas that they like to sit in.
I feed they layer pellets, chicken scratch, cracked corn and chicken crumble, as well as plenty of veggies and some fruit and the breeder said that this should be fine for them, however they just don't seem interested in the food.
Is there something I can do to make them more interested in the food?

 

[WaterfowlWierdo]

Not sure how to help but I have two mallards and a goose that dont really respond to feeding time but the next day the food is always gone, maybe separate them and see if they eat on their own.

 

[Allysha1990]

Yeah I was thinking of doing that, although I am not too sure how I would go about doing that :S I just don't want to come into the coop one day and see that my girls have died because they didn't get enough food

 

[WaterfowlWierdo]

That would be horrible! keep me posted if you figure something out

 

[Going Quackers]

How soon did you introduced these birds to the flock? i would pull them, they are quite small(i keep calls and own Muscovy too) and may very well have a problem getting their own, most ducks raised together sort out differences but newbies can have a rough time especially if they are drastic sizing differences.

The best bet, i have always found is to have newbies(after a quarantine period) be able to see and talk to the flock but not be in with them, this allows time to intro but ensure they don't get hurt and get proper feed.

 

[Allysha1990]

Hi, I have had them for about a week and a half now. The first few days I had them in a cage where they could be seen and spoken to but not touched to help introduce them to the flock but now they are walking around with my other birds. At first the drake was chasing them around and biting them (hence why they were in the cage) but he seems to have lost interest now. Today I put them in a dog carrier with some food and water while I did the rest of my morning chores. I noticed they were eating the grain in the straw i had put in there for them, so I am thinking of buying some grain to feed them. I also sprinkled a little of their feed into the straw and they ate a bit of that

 

[laughingdog]

They could be afraid of the feeders and bowls.. the scovys i got were never feed really or given water of fokd bowls, so just used to foraging and digging for food and water from ground ect. try mounding the straw around bowls to cover and hide at first full of food and water. mine were shy of the food bowl at first, and had to sprinkle feed around. its best if feeding crumbles or or layer to only feed those mostly and off er others as treats, as otherwise it cancels out a lot of nutritional values of one or othe. I feed my scovy and chickens unmedicated chick feed when penned, but just scratch feed when free ranged as they are mosly. i found layer way too rich for all but my pigeons for some reason ( and chick feed too rich for my pigeons, go figure!). Also they being bullied when around others at times will bother them and can injure or kill them even. standard size or large bantam chickens can take an eye easily out of such small ducks. If you have a scovy male size mix, he could kill a male call mix size by mistake, or crush or suffocate a female call trying to mount her. my roosters get uppety with the scovy at times and the male scovy just pluck them up by heads or necks and bash them repeatedly against the ground till the roos go limp, then they release and the roos pop up and run away temp (sometimes they flail screaming running in circles for a min first.

 

[Allysha1990]

They could be afraid of the feeders and bowls.. the scovys i got were never feed really or given water of fokd bowls, so just used to foraging and digging for food and water from ground ect. try mounding the straw around bowls to cover and hide at first full of food and water. mine were shy of the food bowl at first, and had to sprinkle feed around. its best if feeding crumbles or or layer to only feed those mostly and off er others as treats, as otherwise it cancels out a lot of nutritional values of one or othe. I feed my scovy and chickens unmedicated chick feed when penned, but just scratch feed when free ranged as they are mosly. i found layer way too rich for all but my pigeons for some reason ( and chick feed too rich for my pigeons, go figure!). Also they being bullied when around others at times will bother them and can injure or kill them even. standard size or large bantam chickens can take an eye easily out of such small ducks. If you have a scovy male size mix, he could kill a male call mix size by mistake, or crush or suffocate a female call trying to mount her. my roosters get uppety with the scovy at times and the male scovy just pluck them up by heads or necks and bash them repeatedly against the ground till the roos go limp, then they release and the roos pop up and run away temp (sometimes they flail screaming running in circles for a min first.

Holy smokes! My two scovys are still adolescents, so they aren't interested in breeding yet, thank god. They seem to be getting along a bit better with my 2 new ducks, not picking on them that much anymore. I put the girls in their separate cage again today but they still don't seem interested in the food. I tried sprinkling it on the ground, but I still can't tell if they aren't interested or if they don't know that it's food :S. I brought them in the house yesterday and filled up the bathtub to give them a bit of a swim (I know, I'm crazy), and got them to eat quite a bit of food in there (mostly greens that I floated in the water).
It is so frustrating

I am sure they must b e eating something because their poop has substance to it, but I have yet to see them eat in the pen :S