Why 'predator proofing' is a REQUIREMENT!

[tdd2]

We live 'in town', in the suburbs 45 minutes outside of Philadelphia. We do have a small wooded area next to the house, but it is surrounded by homes, several relatively busy streets and plenty of man-made activity.

We came home late last night after our Super Moon paddle at a local lake to find our ducks up and agitated - they are typically in their barn and fast asleep after 8:30pm.

A look at the outdoor game cam (a wonderful birthday gift from my better half last week) this morning showed us why . . . seems we have a new fox in the neighborhood. (we've also captured video of a raccoon, a weasel and several other little critters lately).

It's a good thing we built the barn and pen as predator proof as we did!!





We will however, be locking the ducks inside their barn at night from now on, to keep the predator temptation down.

Predator proof your duckies!!!!

Cheers'

Dan

 

[Miss Lydia]

We live 'in town', in the suburbs 45 minutes outside of Philadelphia. We do have a small wooded area next to the house, but it is surrounded by homes, several relatively busy streets and plenty of man-made activity.

We came home late last night after our Super Moon paddle at a local lake to find our ducks up and agitated - they are typically in their barn and fast asleep after 8:30pm.

A look at the outdoor game cam (a wonderful birthday gift from my better half last week) this morning showed us why . . . seems we have a new fox in the neighborhood. (we've also captured video of a raccoon, a weasel and several other little critters lately).

It's a good thing we built the barn and pen as predator proof as we did!!





We will however, be locking the ducks inside their barn at night from now on, to keep the predator temptation down.

Predator proof your duckies!!!!

Cheers'

Dan

Thank you so much for this, very timely since we see some many say they live in town or the suburbs and have never seen a predator and don't understand why we say how important it is to make sure you have secure housing for your ducks/poultry. So this will be in my book marks so i can show why and that there are predators everywhere .Forgot to add what a nice set up you have too.

 

[iwiw60]

Thank you so much for this, very timely since we see some many say they live in town or the suburbs and have never seen a predator and don't understand why we say how important it is to make sure you have secure housing for your ducks/poultry. So this will be in my book marks so i can show why and that there are predators everywhere .Forgot to add what a nice set up you have too.

I second that! Thanks SO much for your post and video clip. Like Miss Lydia said people that live in the big city think "oh, that'll never happen here!" .... WRONG. As anyone on the BYC forum knows I preach build it like Fort Knox constantly. Some, not all, think I'm a looney bin with overkill on the subject. And looking at new threads in recent weeks can attest, there have been a TON of posts about "what killed my chickens?" and "Raccoon attacked...", etc. and on and on it goes.

Thanks to the OP once again for a great thread!!

 

[Going Quackers]

wow, i so want one of those cameras lol

Anyways, ML is right fantastic video! so many do feel but we live in town or not rurally that we don't have those there.. well, you won't know what you have till you have something they want.

I would also agree with you on locking them up.. that would be scary and i also would not want them to be too accustomed to night visitors and loose that fright reaction.

 

[tdd2]

Thank you for the comments/complimemts!

I had a good look around the outside of the enclosed pen and the duckie barn today, no scratches or claw marks or other indications that anything had tried to get in - I'll consider myself lucky, and warned!

We were locking the small duckie door between the predator proof pen and their enclosed sleeping barn nightly for quite some time, but while we were on vacation last month for a week, we had to leave it open for food/water/indoor pool access while we were away.

And before I get any grief for leaving them for a week - the gravity feeders hold 14+ days worth of food, the 5 gallon waterer holds 10+ days of drinking water, and the indoor pool is topped off with fresh water and the pen cleaned every 6 hours with an automated washer system I designed/installed before we left.

Also, the neighbor came over to check on them twice daily (though I didn't want them opening the pen or duckie barn), AND I had installed a live web cam so I could monitor them (many times) each day while we were away

I sound a bit obsesive with this whole duckie protection thing, you think? We do LOVE our duckies!

Anyway, after last night's video, we are back to locking the duckie door between the enclosed pen and the sleeping barn each night.

Cheers'

Dan

 

[Going Quackers]

Thank you for the comments/complimemts!

I had a good look around the outside of the enclosed pen and the duckie barn today, no scratches or claw marks or other indications that anything had tried to get in - I'll consider myself lucky, and warned!

We were locking the small duckie door between the predator proof pen and their enclosed sleeping barn nightly for quite some time, but while we were on vacation last month for a week, we had to leave it open for food/water/indoor pool access while we were away.

And before I get any grief for leaving them for a week - the gravity feeders hold 14+ days worth of food, the 5 gallon waterer holds 10+ days of drinking water, and the indoor pool is topped off with fresh water and the pen cleaned every 6 hours with an automated washer system I designed/installed before we left.

Also, the neighbor came over to check on them twice daily (though I didn't want them opening the pen or duckie barn), AND I had installed a live web cam so I could monitor them (many times) each day while we were away

I sound a bit obsesive with this whole duckie protection thing, you think? We do LOVE our duckies!

Anyway, after last night's video, we are back to locking the duckie door between the enclosed pen and the sleeping barn each night.

Cheers'

Dan

Well nothing to give grief about there. Can i be a duck of yours lol sounds like a great system you have set up there. I do agree though, i think in the house to avoid any closer contact with your night time friends is best.

 

[Miss Lydia]

Thank you for the comments/complimemts!

I had a good look around the outside of the enclosed pen and the duckie barn today, no scratches or claw marks or other indications that anything had tried to get in - I'll consider myself lucky, and warned!

We were locking the small duckie door between the predator proof pen and their enclosed sleeping barn nightly for quite some time, but while we were on vacation last month for a week, we had to leave it open for food/water/indoor pool access while we were away.

And before I get any grief for leaving them for a week - the gravity feeders hold 14+ days worth of food, the 5 gallon waterer holds 10+ days of drinking water, and the indoor pool is topped off with fresh water and the pen cleaned every 6 hours with an automated washer system I designed/installed before we left.

Also, the neighbor came over to check on them twice daily (though I didn't want them opening the pen or duckie barn), AND I had installed a live web cam so I could monitor them (many times) each day while we were away

I sound a bit obsesive with this whole duckie protection thing, you think? We do LOVE our duckies!

Anyway, after last night's video, we are back to locking the duckie door between the enclosed pen and the sleeping barn each night.

Cheers'

Dan

I'd love to see this design of the automated washer system. You have duckie mansion actually. How many ducks do ya'll have ?

 

[tdd2]

Miss Lydia,

The pen washing system is quite simple really. . .

I ran a hose from the house to the secure pen, and at the house faucet side I have an Orbit programmable yard watering timer.





Ot the other end of the hose, at the enclosed pen, I ran a short section of hose through the framing, with a fitting on each end. Then with another small section of hose and some 1/2 PVC pipe bits . . .




I mounted a standard inexpensive manual lawn sprinkler to the front inside of the pen, facing the back as the washer system. . .


The sprinkler is manually adjustable for how wide a sweep pattern it will go (or in this case, how high up the pen it would spray) and I just set it to go from straight down (starting right below it) to straight back. This spray action washes the duckie dirt from the front of the pen to the back of the pen.

Since the duckies spend most of their time around the indoor pool when inside the secure pen, this is where the majority of the 'duckie dumplings' are, so the spray washer is only set up to wash out the side of the pen where the pool is . . .

On the back of the pen, when I built it I designed in a 1/2" gap between the lower rear cross frame and the floor . . .






So that waste water could be washed out the back, and into a gutter system that carries the waste water out into the woods behind the duckie pen/barn. . .





Also, I ran PVC tubing up one of the main frame members, and across the ceiling to a plastic shower head mounted over the indoor pool, to refresh the water while the sprinkler hosed out the pen. . . (in the still shot below, you can see the spray streams from the washer at the lower tight, while the shower head freshens the pool water at the top center)




We really only use the automatic system when we are away (just for the day, or on vacation). I typically have the timer set to turn on for 5 minutes, every 6 hours. In that time the washer system works phenomenally well cleaning up the mess, and in that same amount of time, the pool gets several gallons of fresh refill from the shower - and usually one or both ducks jump in for a nice bath while it's running - they LOVE the shower !!


Hope that helps to effectively describe what my automated pen washing / indoor pool filling system does

And to answer your second question, we have 2 ducks (currently), one male Pekin - 'Squirt', and one female Khaki Campbell - 'Khaki'. We had a second Pekin - 'Chunk', but lost him abruptly in May to an unknown medical problem, when he was 2 months old

Come spring, I have plans to acquire a couple of TSQ Welsh Harlequins (with the possibility of becoming a WH breeding source) to add to the flock

Cheers'

Dan

 

[littlefrog]

Cool camera!

I have lost my share of ducks to racoons and mink, so my new duck barn is kind of like Fort Knox...

 

[Shellz]

That watering system is the cat's bum! Kudos on such a fine habitat for your ducks.