winter duck care

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I just got my awesome ice free pond this winter...you can see a pic on my page
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Without power though I would stick to rubber buckets...
https://www.backyardchickens.com/web/viewblog.php?id=15836-duck-raisinghousing
I have had major difficulties with predators in the past, so all of my poultry are locked in wooden houses at night. I put down 4" of shavings for them to snuggle in. The duck coop has a red 60W light bulb on a thermo-cube over their indoor water bucket to keep it from freezing, and slightly increase the temp in the house. The ducks love sliding around on the snow, so I don't shovel in their pen at all.
 
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OK how do you do it? That pool is wicked!! but how do you keep it clean?? do you have water running in there for the pool refilling??? How fast does it get dirty? I cant imagine that here! MOst water would be frozen splashed up to the walls and floor would be an ice rink!
 
I siphon out the water each weekend and refill it. I keep a long hose drained out and rolled up so it doesn't freeze closed. There is a small layer of mud/sludge at the bottom by then, but the water is still ok. We have sandy soil, so the drainage is pretty great. I did spread straw around it when the old snow was getting turned into ice and making it slippery. Now the ducks are looking pretty and not crunchy even in the middle of winter!
 
Probably a good time to revive this thread...

My biggest issue is the water. The winters are not usually bad but I don't think I can leave the hose on (with a spray head) all the time like now. In fact, I hope I don't need to roll it up everyday, I have no idea! Never owned a hose before (I'm a big city condo girl).
 
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Me too!! I have a pretty good idea of what to do just from reading things on BYC, but still I want to be sure I am providing adequate care and shelter for my two. I even considered getting a small hen house and putting them in the sunroom at night through the winter. It still get's pretty cold in the sunroom so they will still feel the cold, it's just more sheltered from rain, wind and snow...and hungry predators at night. I actually used the sunroom when they were little so they could acclimate themselves to the outdoors before I put them in thier outdoor pen all night.
 
We live in fairly cold winter country - temps below zero are pretty common at night, sometimes even 20 below or so. It is dry and windy, but we do get some snow. I use galvanized buckets for their water. I have some nice 3 gallon buckets that are shorter and wider than average. I put bucket heaters in them and that works fine for the winter. They make a lot of ice around the bucket, I throw straw on that. We bed down with straw because its cheap and local and toss it on top of any nasty frozen mess or slippery ice and clean it all in the spring. When things freeze up here for the winter, they freeze solid. I've found my biggest problem was a duck that had injured himself earlier slipping on the ice and re-injuring himself. I'd kept him in until I thought he was ok, but he wasn't. They do make things slippery and they don't much like that, neither do I. More straw fixes that - I need to go get a load soon for this winter. I am able to get it directly from a local farmer, works great.

The ducks have an unheated, but insulated shed. It has ventilation, and I can close it up when it's really cold and windy. It has sliding doors and we put in a "duck door" so we can close it up and give them outside access if it seems necessary. Mostly I find they do great as long as they have protection from the wind. If I use a second pen in the winter (I have four pens and a small yard and a big one), it has an Igloo dog house (a big one) that they can use to get out of the wind. The back of those pens are wrapped with tarps year round for wind in the winter and shade in the summer. Mostly they like lots of fresh dry straw.

For bathing, I put out contractor's tubs that are used for mixing concrete - a small one under our freeze proof spigot makes a great bathtub and you can turn it over, flex it and dump the ice easily. I put out bathing water most days, but not when its really awful.

Mostly ducks are tough and hardy and not too hard to take care of.
 
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