The Quack Shack

[WannaBeHillBilly]

Winter is coming...

... And I checked what the longest period of darkness will be before the winter solstice.

It will be 15 hours 20 minutes

That sounds like a very long time for the ducks to be without not only food but also water in their coop. And I do need to close them up for the night because of many interested animals roaming around.

Should I

1 - put some water in the duck house after all, maybe with some kind of grid or small openings so that it will be at least somewhat harder to spray it all around? (I'm aware that they will find a way to some degree anyway)

2 - not worry about it, 15 hours is still OK? (sounds worrisome but I don't know)

3 - extend the day by setting up lights in the orchard so that they can stay outside a couple of hours longer? (how will foxes, weasels etc behave in this situation? will they be vary of the lights or possibly even attracted? I've seen some devices for sale that produce randomly flashing lights but not sure how effective that is)

4 - build a fully wire-enclosed run in front of the coop so the water can be left in there? (probably the best option but I'm not sure I'll be able to do that in this season)

...?

Thank you!

I'm not voting, i'm just describing how i keep my ducks:
They have their duck-house that measures about 4x4m and is divided into 3½ rooms. There is a mudroom in the front where the entrance is located, a living-room with the poop-door to the back and two bedrooms on the left side of the house.
There is no food and water at all in the duck-house, except for duck mommas and their ducklings.
In front of the house there is a 3x4m duck-run where i have a rubber-made tote with elbows as a pellet feeder, a smaller tote with some Xinese-made feeder-ports for the calcium, a waterer with a float-valve and a stand for the supper-bowl.
There is a small night-light inside of the duck-house, too small to be perceived by a duck's metabolism as "long day", i just have a couple of ducks that are scared of darkness.
So the ducks have access to food and water 24x7x365 and i have observed that they really enjoy that - maybe even need that. I have seen them getting up at night, walking into the run, eating some pellets, dabble through the supper-bowl for a missed treat, grabbing a billfull of calcium and then hangout with a friend for a while at the bar (waterer). Then walk back inside and sleep a bit more. Seems all very natural behaviour to me.
Outside lights: I have dusk-to-dawn light around the house and whenever i am late, the ducks stay within the lighted area. So far i was lucky and had no attacks during that time. Those lights seem to scare away the "wild" predators like foxes and coyotes. But i have had raccoons and opossums using the light to casually walk into the duck-run and plunder the pellet-feeder. Again, i was lucky no attack on the ducks.
No clue how large your orchard is, but i would not put any lighting in there to encourage the ducks to walk out there. If you want to allow your ducks to stay out a bit longer, make sure they stay close to the house and there are some human-noises, like people talking, kitchen sounds from cooking, …
There is a reason why i am nervous about the Incubator-Gang sleeping on the pond! - I do hope they sleep on and not around the pond.
I hope that helps.

 

[Muscovy Wunda]

Happy 5 years of BYC to me!!

 

[Miss Lydia]

Happy 5 years of BYC to me!!

Congratulations!!

 

[WannaBeHillBilly]

Happy 5 years of BYC to me!!

Congratulations!

You have joined in the same year that i did, just two months later.

 

[Luv Ducks]

Yes, i have observed that too, some of the females are "preferred" by all the drakes. My white Layers, including Blanca duck all have semi-bald spots on their necks where no feathers grow, just down.

That's the hard part of all of this. They say to have 4-6 females for each male and I had 9 for mine and he still only wanted the one and made her head bleed so I rehomed him. Hopefully my new drake in the spring that will be mating age will like variety, lol.

 

[Luv Ducks]

Congratulations!!

Yes, Congratulations!!!!!

 

[Luv Ducks]

Sounds like Blanca's problem. She was the most popular hen a couple of years in a row. Thankfully she has almost stopped laying this year and is now much less interesting for the drakes. Somehow they know that she is less fertile now. Their attention has shifted more to Sandals Duck (Her feet look like she is wearing sandals), but she is by far the largest duck i have and she is always accompanied by Boots, my largest drake, so all the other drakes adore her but cannot reach out. I wonder what will happen next spring though...

It always seems to be a mystery until the hormones start raging. I did not want another drake but took chances getting two Runner ducks from our Rural King and ended up with my usual, a male and a female.

 

[Luv Ducks]

I'm not voting, i'm just describing how i keep my ducks:
They have their duck-house that measures about 4x4m and is divided into 3½ rooms. There is a mudroom in the front where the entrance is located, a living-room with the poop-door to the back and two bedrooms on the left side of the house.
There is no food and water at all in the duck-house, except for duck mommas and their ducklings.
In front of the house there is a 3x4m duck-run where i have a rubber-made tote with elbows as a pellet feeder, a smaller tote with some Xinese-made feeder-ports for the calcium, a waterer with a float-valve and a stand for the supper-bowl.
There is a small night-light inside of the duck-house, too small to be perceived by a duck's metabolism as "long day", i just have a couple of ducks that are scared of darkness.
So the ducks have access to food and water 24x7x365 and i have observed that they really enjoy that - maybe even need that. I have seen them getting up at night, walking into the run, eating some pellets, dabble through the supper-bowl for a missed treat, grabbing a billfull of calcium and then hangout with a friend for a while at the bar (waterer). Then walk back inside and sleep a bit more. Seems all very natural behaviour to me.
Outside lights: I have dusk-to-dawn light around the house and whenever i am late, the ducks stay within the lighted area. So far i was lucky and had no attacks during that time. Those lights seem to scare away the "wild" predators like foxes and coyotes. But i have had raccoons and opossums using the light to casually walk into the duck-run and plunder the pellet-feeder. Again, i was lucky no attack on the ducks.
No clue how large your orchard is, but i would not put any lighting in there to encourage the ducks to walk out there. If you want to allow your ducks to stay out a bit longer, make sure they stay close to the house and there are some human-noises, like people talking, kitchen sounds from cooking, …
There is a reason why i am nervous about the Incubator-Gang sleeping on the pond! - I do hope they sleep on and not around the pond.
I hope that helps.

My ducks have 5 different places they can go into for shelter. I have a very large pen. One area that has 6 heated water bowls, another that has 3 black rubber Fortex bowls with water in them that are not heated. I have 4 different stations where there are bowls with food in them for them. I have 2 small Call Drakes and 1 Mallard Drake along with 12 hens of various sizes, the smallest being Mallards and the largest being a huge Mule duck that is female. Everyone gets along just fine and I keep the food and water bowls filled 24/7. I have Nite Guard lites on all sides of the pen and it is up against my house. In three years I have had one raccoon attack when I had put two three week old Runner Ducks in a separate part of the pen and it killed both of them. I attributed that to the ducklings peeping and it hearing them and not fearing the blinking lights that are supposed to deter them and had always worked up until that point. We trapped two coons right after that and disposed of them. This setup works for me, no one gets locked in anywhere at night and they do eat and drink during the night hours. We hear them up and about being next to our bedroom but they are not loud enough to really bother us.

 

[WannaBeHillBilly]

It always seems to be a mystery until the hormones start raging. I did not want another drake but took chances getting two Runner ducks from our Rural King and ended up with my usual, a male and a female.

I had ordered a dozen female ducklings from Metzer Darms last year and one of the Black Swedish turned out to be a drake. Following the tradition he was named Ralphie Dux.
He was my largest drake until Boots - also Black Swedish - hatched and grew up this year.

 

[Luv Ducks]

I had ordered a dozen female ducklings from Metzer Darms last year and one of the Black Swedish turned out to be a drake. Following the tradition he was named Ralphie Dux.
He was my largest drake until Boots - also Black Swedish - hatched and grew up this year.

Did you let Metzer know about the mix up and if you did was anything done about it? I am just curious about that. My two Mallard ducklings I got from them have been great layers. One is bigger than the other one and the smaller one can fly well. She has only left the outside pen once and luckily a neighbor knowing I had ducks returned her to me.