[SustainableTompkins] caring for baby ducks?

[Simon St.Laurent]

goodsell wrote:
> Caring for baby ducks is only slightly different than caring for baby 
> chicks. You should be able to get a game bird starter at your local feed 
> store. You might have to shop around if you're looking for organic feed in 
> particular. But game birds require a higher protein level than chickens.

Tractor Supply Company had a general chick formula that included ducks, 
which I used for a while, but I went to Game & Turkey Starter, then 
grower, then finisher/maintenance from Agway.  Definitely stay away from 
feeds with antibiotics in them, and ducks need lots of niacin, 
apparently more than is in chicken feed.

Definitely make sure they _always_ have water to drink.  (They don't 
need to swim, but they definitely need to drink.

> Keeping the chicks fed, watered, warm, clean, and safe are your priorities 
> especially with the threat of a predator eminent. I'm not sure if you're 
> planning on letting "mom" brood out her chicks or taking the chicks and 
> brooding them yourself. Your situation and your decisions on how you wish to 
> raise these little ones will depend how you should proceed.

I'm not sure what the current duck defensive situation looks like, I've 
been using electroplastic fence while working on building a more 
permanent home for my ducks.  (I had 11, and gave a pair away this 
morning.)  It keeps predators away really well, but your ducklings might 
be small enough to go through it, or worse, get stuck in it.

(I started with mail-order ducklings, so put them in a brooder box, then 
in a rabbit cage, and then in a fenced area.  But they didn't have a 
mother to help them at all, so that was different.  I hope to start 
raising our own ducks next year.  I need to update it, but you can get a 
sense of what we did at:

http://livingindryden.org/mt/mt-search.cgi?tag=ducks&blog_id=15

)

I've been contemplating starting a Tompkins (or Finger Lakes) ducks 
mailing list - if there's interest, let me know.


Thanks,
Simon St.Laurent
http://simonstl.com/