How Much Will My Ducks Eat?

A question that a lot of people have, including those that have been in the waterfowl community for a while, is how much ducks eat.

Please keep in mind that these are approximations of what a duck will eat if given free choice of a balanced ration and will vary according to temperature, exercise, and genetics.

Pounds of Feed Per Day Per Duck
	Week 1	Week 2	Week 3	Week 4	Week 5	Week 6	Week 7
Pekin	.07	.23	.35	.40	.45	.50	.55
All Others	.05	.10	.15	.21	.27	.33	.40
Runners	.05	.08	.11	.15	.2	.25	.30
Mallards	.04	.06	.08	.10	.13	.17	.20

Pounds of Feed Per Day Per Duck – After About 12 Weeks of Age
	Laying Females	Non-Laying Females and Males
Pekin	.48	.40
All Others	.40	.35
Runners	.30	.25
Mallards	.20	.15

We hope this helps you in making feed and feeding decisions for your birds.

How much space should I have for my ducks?

Bigger is always better when it comes to duck enclosures. This holds true at all stages of a duck’s life from hatching to the end of its days. The following suggestions are for enclosed areas with a roof. If you plan on keeping your adult ducks in an open pen with no shelter, you need much more space than a covered pen or building.

Ducklings up to 3 weeks old need 1 square foot per duckling and a minimum of 5 square feet for small groups. This means if you have 4 ducklings, you need at least 5 square feet. If you have 10 ducklings, you need at least 10 square feed of space or more. If you have 100 ducklings, you need at least 100 square feet of space or more.

From age 4-8 weeks, the young ducks need about 3 square feet per bird and a minimum of 16 square feet of space. If you have 5 ducks, that means they need a minimum of 16 square feet. If you have 10 ducks, they need 30 square feet. With 100 ducks, they need 300 square feet.

From age 9-17 weeks, the ducks are now fully grown and will require a minimum of 3.5 square feet per bird and 20 square feet minimum. If you have 5 birds, you need a minimum of 20 square feet. For 10 birds, 35 square feet. With 100 ducks, 350 square feet of space.

Lastly, from age 18 weeks and up is when the ducks become sexually mature and start wanting to mate and lay eggs. This requires at least 4 square feet per duck and a minimum of 24 square feet. If you have 5 birds, they need a minimum of 24 square feet. For 10 birds, 40 square feet. For 100, then 400 square feet.

Keep in mind these are the numbers we highly suggest for enclosed areas with a roof. They can have outside areas during the day, but this is the amount of sheltered space they need, whether they spend their entire day in it or just their nights. Cramped areas can lead to not just health issues including leg and weight problems, but also a higher likelihood of fighting, wetter pens, more smell, dirtier birds, and pens requiring more bedding. We have found that by doubling the square footage per bird, your bedding needs will probably drop by 50%.

Please use the table below as a guide to determine how much space you need and how many ducks you can keep.

As geese are twice the size of ducks, at least double these recommended actions for geese. In other words, 2 week old goslings need at least 2 sq ft each. Guineas and chickens require 75% of the space for a duck.

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Square Footage for Duck Pen
	Age
	up to 3 weeks	4-8 weeks	9-17 weeks	18+ weeks
Enclosure with a roof*	1 sq ft per bird (min 5 sq ft)	3 sq ft per bird (min 16 sq ft)	3.5 sq ft per bird (min 20 sq ft)	4 sq ft per bird (min 24 sq ft)
Pasture with no shelter	Should still be in brooder	Should still be in brooder**	40 sq ft per bird	50 sq ft per bird
* Do not consider outside run when calculating enclosure size.
** Ducklings can go outside around 6-8 weeks depending on the weather and how well they are feathering.

Hatching Process and When to Help

Hatching your own eggs is a wonderful experience. Caring for the eggs, making sure the temperature is just right, ensuring there is enough humidity, and then going through the nerve wracking experience of watching the chicks’ struggle to escape the shell can be very rewarding. After all of your hard work, of course you will be nervous the little ones hatch successfully. Then you see one that seems to be in trouble. Your first instinct may be to help it, and that is fine, but you should know a few things first.

As it incubates, the embryo is encased by a membrane consisting of blood vessels. These vessels provide oxygen that enters the egg through the shell to the embryo. Several days before hatching, this network of vessels begins to break down and the embryo lacks sufficient oxygen. The egg will have slowly dried out during incubation, forming an air sack. This sack is pierced by the chick in order to get oxygen. Since there is not a lot of air in the sack, the chick will continue to peck until it ‘pips’ a tiny protrusion on the shell which allows for a greater flow of oxygen. After pipping, the chick will rest for 12 to 24 hours.

Once the chick has rested, it starts to make its way out of the egg. It starts at the pip before turning slightly and pecking again. The chick will continue this pattern around the egg until it forms a ‘lid’ which it can push open and wiggle out the rest of the way. During this process, the chick will take several breaks until it is finished about 1 to 3 hours later.

These rest periods are where most nervous soon-to-be bird parents think they are needed the most. After seeing and hearing movement only to have them go quiet and still can be stressful. Knowing when and when not to help a chick hatch is important.

When you help could mean life or death for the chick. If you help before the network of blood veins has completely broken down, you can cause the chick to bleed to death. Following are three scenarios and our recommendations for each.

• The chick forms a hole where it pipped and does not start rotating within the shell. In this situation you must be careful as not everything went as it should. You can try to help, but stop and try several hours later if you see blood forming where you have broken the shell.
  
  In the following video, we did not see blood until the 'lid' had been taken off. Make sure to stop and try again several hours later whenever you see blood.
  
  

  
  
• If the duckling has started turning and breaking the shell, then runs into a problem and stops turning, you can normally help them without a problem. The key is they have started turning in the shell which means the blood vessels under the shell have shut down and you can help them without fear of excessive bleeding. Gently pull the head out from under the wing and allow the chick to escape the rest of the egg on its own.
  
  The following video shows a variety of eggs where the 'lid' has not been developed and the chick has not turned, but we were able to help them because there was no blood.
  
  

  
  
• If the chick has gone completely around and formed a ‘lid’ only to get stuck, you can definitely help them out by removing the cap.
  
  

Many believe that helping during hatch will make the chick weak. This is not necessarily true. You could have a perfectly healthy and fit chick, but due to less than ideal incubation conditions, it may not be able to hatch on its own. On the flip side, it is possible to get a weaker chick when helping a less than healthy chick to hatch. As author and waterfowl expert Holderread says, hatching is like a “fitness test” for the chicks.

Bird Shippers of America and Salmonella

Shipping poultry across the US is a very big industry. All across the nation, people are ordering birds and picking them up at their local post office throughout the year. Thanks to the internet, the industry is growing daily and information is being constantly shared. Because of this, everyone with access to a computer or a phone is able to bring poultry on to their property as pets and farm animals, yet many are unaware of what raising poultry entails.

Other than the obvious care and management required to keep poultry, many, especially those looking to keep birds as pets, are unaware of the health risks associated with the task. That is where Bird Shippers ofAmerica (BSOA) comes in. BSOA is an online organization dedicated to the education and safe practice of raising fowl. It endeavors to be a vital source of information for all of your bird raising needs and “ - to improve the Backyard Poultry Industry”. This includes information of different breeds of birds, various tips and tricks in raising them, and making people aware of the dangers of Salmonella and how to protect you and your loved ones.

Salmonella causes 1.2 million illnesses, 23,000 hospitalizations, and 450 deaths every year within the US according to the Center for Disease Control (CDC). Most Salmonella infections come from food, but there are some strains of Salmonella that do not harm poultry but are carried by them and can infect people. It is because of these strains of Salmonella that those handling poultry must be careful.

To help educate our customers, we include a pamphlet from the CDC attached to the back of each invoice about the dos and don’ts when handling fowl.

Do:

• Wash hands after handling live poultry
• Adults should supervise hand washing for young children
• Use sanitizer if soap is not available until you are able to wash your hands

Don’t:

• Do not let those with weak immune systems, the elderly, or children under 5 handle live poultry
• Do not keep live poultry in the house, bathroom, or any area where food or drink is prepared, served, or stored
• No snuggling
• No kissing

We invite you to read about Salmonella from the BSOA site and to continue to use its resources for any current and future poultry projects.

If you are involved with the mail-order poultry shipping industry, we also you encourage you to join the organization. Membership benefits includes the sharing of information within the poultry industry, access to updated information on research for the caring and shipping of day-old poultry, an avenue of information and response to any legislative changes that would adversely affect the industry, and a discount on postage for shipping your poultry.

Below is an infographic provided by the BSOA regarding precautions against Salmonella.

Improving Mobility in Older Geese

A customer contacted us about how she improved the mobility of her older goose, Oliver, with Cosequin.

“Hello to all,

 

I am sharing this in the hope that it may help another goose. I have a goose named Oliver that I rescued 12 years ago. He was full grown so I don't know his real age. About 6 years ago he started to walk less and less and began just staying stationary in the yard until being put in the barn at night. He got to the point that he would barely walk and had to be picked up and carried most of the time. He would get stuck in the bedding in his barn with his feet behind him just shoveling deeper holes.

I have a wonderful bird vet in Dr. Gary Riggs. Several years ago we exhausted every avenue to get Oliver mobile again. He had Adequan injections. He was on Gabapentin and Tramadol. He even had little Dr. Scholls gel insoles glued to his feet for part of the Summer. Nothing helped him. Dr. Riggs described his feet as "gnarly". His toes are not smooth and straight as they should be and look as they may have been broken or infected at one time.

So here is the thing. About six months [ago] I put the dogs on Cosequin. There are 3 different kinds and I actually bought all three. I contacted Dr. Riggs to see if it would be ok to try on Oliver. I started Oliver on the green label bottle simply because that is the first one I bought. [The pills are] shaped like a little dog bone. It breaks in half easily. I wrap each piece in a little ball of bread and pop it down his throat. In two weeks I "thought" I saw an improvement. Now six months later I see him doing things I haven't seen him do in years. Walking....not as much as the girls but he will get up and walk a bit and graze. I have actually looked out the kitchen window and done a double take in that he was in the pond - by himself. I used to have to carry him to get him to go for a swim. He gets up and comes to the barn at night when he sees me getting water buckets ready. He can hop up in the barn with a wing flap but no longer has to be picked up.

It is the only thing he is on at this point. I have no doubt it has made a major improvement in his mobility.

I hope this helps someone else.

Linda, Reebok, Oliver and Piper”

Linda’s story reminds us that sometimes solutions to your birds’ problems can come from obscure places. If you find that your older birds have issues walking, you can try this and see if there is any improvement. From brief searches (thank you Google!), we found that Cosequin is an over-the-counter supplement for older dogs and cats that help with joint pain and Boswellia is considered an anti-inflammatory.

We do not know if this actually works or not, however, as we are not a certified vet. If you do try this, please let us know the results! If you have found an excellent cure for other waterfowl problems, please write us with your story!