Let’s Talk About Ducks
Eleven seconds of video, four hours to learn how to get the video off my camera and into this post!
I got these ducks a month ago and they have been more fun than I ever imagined – they are sociable and curious. Best of all, they come when they are called, and after a day of wandering the yard and the pond’s edge, they put themselves into their pen at night!
They also run to their pen whenever something has startled or excited them (like an egret flying across the pond), so a few times a day I look up to see them tearing back to their pen. It’s like watching little velociraptors run through the yard.
I think that they are runner ducks, which were bred in Asia. They would walk out to the rice paddies with their owners, dabble in the shallow water to eat bugs and weeds all day, and then walk home at night. These ducks have the upright stance associated with runners, and they show the same behaviors – they prefer being in just a few inches of water to actually swimming, and they seem to love their commute to the pond. No one knew what breed they were when I bought them, but I think they are the perfect fit for our yard.
They dabble around the edge of the pond most of the day but they haven’t gone in swimming.
So sleek and streamlined.
To give a complete picture though, I must admit that they are messy. They dip their bills into water as they eat, and then splash water all over – it doesn’t take long for their pen to smell bad. If you have plenty of room, it’s no problem, but I don’t think ducks are a good choice for urban and suburban yards.
If you are reading this post in an email, I don’t think the video will show, I think you have to go to the original post. Yes, you can admire their cuteness in these still shots, but to be truly amused, I think you need to see them when they are running.
This is this week’s entry for 3:00 – 4:00 pm on the 1 Day 1 World Project. I told myself that I would use this project to learn something new about my camera each week – I am happy I finally learned how to upload videos from it!
Wow, I love it! Thanks for sharing your day (and ducks) with us. 🙂
I wish I could capture the way they kind of dance in place when they are excited about being fed, or let out of the pen. They are having a little party, all the time.
How fun!
Oh, my! They are so cute! And you’ve done good detective work regarding the kind of duck they are–they don’t look like the wild ones I see around here at all!
I am the person who buys all the big full-color books about farm animals at Tractor Supply…the ones for farm rookies. That’s where I found the information! 🙂
I cannot believe how quickly they have grown from their little downy duckling selves!
But they are still adorable – but maybe, as their mom, I’m biased. 🙂
Ducks! They are so much fun!
Yes, if we were together, we would be like those moms one-upping each other with their kids’ achievements – “Did you know my ducks come in before curfew?” “Well, my chickens are getting very close to clucking the National Anthem!” 🙂
This ducky post came to me as nourishment. Don’t know why. Kind of silly beauty in an anxious world. Thanks for this. John
I worry about you because you feel the burdens of the whole world so heavily. I am not trying to turn a blind eye to the sad things in the world, and your posts make me aware of a lot of events I haven’t heard about otherwise, and then I hold those affected in my heart too. But I am glad for any moment of lightness I can provide to you or to others who could use one! 🙂
I am raising my first chcikens this year. They’re fun and I’ve been thinking of ducks next year. We might build a little pond and a pen for them. Was it hard to get them to learn to go back to the pen? Do you worry about them flying off or being taken by a hawk?
We have a big pond, but I put off getting ducks for just those reasons – I was worried about them either flying off or being someone’s dinner. And I bought these at Tractor Supply and they had up a big sign that said they didn’t know what kind of ducks they were, and that they might even be migratory species. But since they turned out to be runner ducks, their wings are very small, and I don’t even know if they can fly at all.
When they were very small, I kept them in a dog crate in the kitchen, with cedar shavings for bedding, and chick starter for food. (You have to be sure to get unmedicated chick starter, because the ducklings eat more of it than chicks do, and they can overdose on the medicine!) They have to have water to dip their beaks in, so I put a pan of water in with them and just kept changing it to keep it clean.
I poured out their food from a red plastic cup and after a few days, they recognized the cup and knew I was going to feed them. I took the whole crate outside, put the ducks into a big plastic tub while I cleaned the crate, but always fed them in the dog crate. When they got bigger, I put the dog crate into the dog kennel and let them out to “play”, but still always fed them in the crate itself. Now I feed them just anywhere in the kennel, but they put themselves back into the kennel in the evening, and into the crate at night. Maybe they would have done that from day one, and all my routine was unnecessary, but I was afraid to find out! And I don’t know if other breeds of ducks would be such homebodies. I bought the FFA book on poultry and it wasn’t specific enough to be really helpful.
They have a big tub of water in the kennel too and I change it every day.
I do worry about hawks and raccoons – I hope that the kennel doesn’t turn out to be just a gathering pen that predators find convenient! I have one of those kennel covers over it so I hope that discourages hawks.
I hope this was helpful! Ducks are lots of fun!
What a hoot to get to raise these ducks! They are soo cute!! Since you’ve had them since they were babies, I’m sure they contend you’re “Momma” and will follow you wherever. I’m like you though, beware of the hawks.
They do follow me! But then they get within about a foot of me, and stop, thinking, “Wait, what are we supposed to do now?” and then run off again. But it makes it easy to get them wherever I need them to go!
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