The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Livestock => Poultry & Waterfowl => Topic started by: Alex_ on June 04, 2017, 09:55:15 pm
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I have some ducklings due to hatch soon. A first for me.
They are with their mother in a large dog house. Should i put food and water in the dog house next to the nest or outside the dog house?
Should i put adult and chick food in seperate containers for the birds?
Thanks guys
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The mother can have chick crumb so no need for layers pellets. Make sure the chick crumb doesn't have coccidiostat in it though (I.e must not be medicated). Allen and page do a non medicated crumb and duck& goose grower pellet. This is really important as the medication can kill ducklings. Keep them under cover for a couple of weeks- mine have a house with run attached, food and water need topping up regularly as they are really mucky so best kept outside. But we have a lot of farm cats and magpies/crows. Other than that leave mum to it :-)
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Thanks Twizzel.
I will be waiting a few days before allowing the adult birds and their offspring to mingle together again. Will 4 days be enough?
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I always put crumb and water right next to a sitting duck. My reasoning is that she might sit for 2-3 days on any eggs that didn't hatch by which time the ducklings would be very hungry. I doubt they'd be able to wonder outside to eat and find their way back. I also keep mine under cover for 4 weeks, in a run away from the other ducks, just to protect them from magpies etc. I wouldn't allow the /duckducklings in with other ducks either, I find that the boys will pounce on her as soon as they see her and she could run off and leave the ducklings.
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I've always mixed mine back together after the ducklings are a couple of weeks old, but then my drake is pretty chilled and there's only 1 other duck. They are always housed separately overnight though. Sometimes I've had the odd late egg hatching by which point the duck has decided to take her babies off the nest anyway so I've brought it in under a lamp and let it hatch in the house, returning the duckling when it's hatched, never had a problem with that. They are fine without food and water for up to 24hours after hatching but by the time they are a day old they'll need crumb and water.
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Thanks for the help guys. I will leave the ducks seperate for a while.