What ifs and free ranging ducks?

[nao57]

So I've been wondering how do you free range your ducks?

Is it possible to do it so well you could potentially not have to buy feed?

I'm thinking about what if I couldn't buy feed next spring. A few weeks ago around where I live the stores looked completely barren. They have bounced back and now have stuff, but if that can happen once it can happen again. In WW2, also people in Europe had to eat chicken feed to avoid starvation.

This makes me think its actually practical and a good practice exercise to get advise and talk about how to feed ducks if you couldn't buy their feed in the stores for some reason. (Variety of reasons possible.)

I wonder what you guys could teach me about free ranging possibilities. Thank you ahead of time.

 

[Isaac 0]

All my birds are free-ranged without a fence on the property, while the feed bill will go down drastically free-ranging your birds, they will still need a provided food source. Free-ranging is risky business, everywhere had predators that would love to dine on some ducks, I cut down on losses by trapping and shooting, but i still lose around one or two birds each year to predators.

 

[CoriM]

There was actually a thread on BYC a few weeks ago about strategies to feed poultry if stores ran out of food. I can't find it now! Anyway, I think you still have to provide food even if they're free-ranging. My neighbor free-ranges as she has a beautiful pond. She lost half her flock in the first year (8) - probably mostly due to birds of prey.

 

[Ratchnick]

If you want to free range i would get anconas or runners. Anconas are bread for ranging and runners have a very low food requirement. If you have land you can grow good duck food. Potatoes are easy to grow and suprisingly good food. Dave holderread said in his book you can stretch normal feed 50% with potatoes. If you grow other things and let them range i think you could get buy with no feed. That being said i have stocked up on enough feed for 6 ducks for 2 years. Buy in bulk, save money, added stability as a nice side benefit.

 

[DuckyDonna]

If you want to free range i would get anconas or runners. Anconas are bread for ranging and runners have a very low food requirement. If you have land you can grow good duck food. Potatoes are easy to grow and suprisingly good food. Dave holderread said in his book you can stretch normal feed 50% with potatoes. If you grow other things and let them range i think you could get buy with no feed. That being said i have stocked up on enough feed for 6 ducks for 2 years. Buy in bulk, save money, added stability as a nice side benefit.

It would seem like that food might go bad after 2 years.

 

[Ratchnick]

My feed is in my house, temp and humidity controlled. Feed will stay stable a long time if its well stored.

 

[Isaac 0]

I've read even if it's stored properly it starts to lose much of its nutritional value after six months or so.

 

[nao57]

If you want to free range i would get anconas or runners. Anconas are bread for ranging and runners have a very low food requirement. If you have land you can grow good duck food. Potatoes are easy to grow and suprisingly good food. Dave holderread said in his book you can stretch normal feed 50% with potatoes. If you grow other things and let them range i think you could get buy with no feed. That being said i have stocked up on enough feed for 6 ducks for 2 years. Buy in bulk, save money, added stability as a nice side benefit.

Does it matter if the potato bits are cooked or raw?

Although I'm sort of greedy about potatoes myself. But its cool that you could even give them that! I feel asking to find this alone was way worth it! (Have you seen how much land growing your own grain takes?! :O ...)

Also hearing the food requirement on Anconas and runners is totally interesting also! I want to ask how much lower food requirement? And is that only reccomended temporary? Also what you said I don't think I would have found in a book. So the mentoring here is very valuable. (North America I think is still even discovering runners?)

 

[Ratchnick]

The potatoes have to be cooked, that's the one downside.

Runners eat about .35 lbs of feed a day, vs up to .6 lbs a day for larger breeds. Most of this i got from "storeys guide to raising ducks" i highly recommend it.

Here is some info on anconas, and ducks vs chickens. This is written by carol deppe, a phd geneticist who breeds new varieties of crops.

https://www.boondockersfarm.com/Pages/Delaware.html
Here is an interesting tidbit, lots more in the full article:

Anconas have more sophisticated flock behavior than most breeds. They usually have female leaders, who may or may not be the dominant ducks(s). (Anconas know that fighting ability and wisdom are two different things.) Having female leaders means that an Ancona flock spends more of its time in the best foraging areas. (Females care much more about foraging than males because of the demons of egg production.) Campbell and Harlequin ducks usually follow the drakes. What drakes care most about is mating. A male-led flock spends most of it's time on and near the bathing pool, the favorite mating spot, which rapidly becomes denuded and isn't good forage. By the time the drakes are all through mating, the worms and slugs have been eaten by someone else or have retreated and aren't available. So while Campbell and Harlequin individual ducks forage as well as Ancona individuals, as flocks, Anconas forage much more effectively.

 

[nao57]

There's flock leaders too? Is that all ducks that have a flock leader or just those Anconas? Is the flock leader the same all the time, or different from one day to the next?

Wow this is interesting.

On potatoes, could you feed them that all the time, or only for like half or less? Curious about that. (Waste of potato in a way but fun to figure out.)