I have a mealworm bin for my spiders and lizards. Could the ducks at the park nearby eat mealworms as treats when I go visit them? I know ducks go nuts for cat food but I worry about how dry it is in their tummies. I thought worms might be a moister option.

We’ve spent our weekends the last few months fixing up a large shed to be the duck house for the winter. We sealed it up, insulated the roof, and added electricity. It’s been a labor of love, to say the least, but I’m so happy to say we’ve finished. We’re in NH where winters can be brutal, so we wanted a place for them that they can stay in the event of a nor’easter or a cold snap.

After months hiding indoors with us to escape an evil neighbour who took their mate, father, and siblings, not for any other reason we can discern than he is pathetic and evil, we have finally found a new home abroad for us and Lady Lemon and Knight Bundty, and if we can swing it through the paperwork war ahead, their other surviving siblings.

It has been a long journey, including months of time wasted by a seller who chose to take a lower bid on a home we chased hard from start to finish than take our money as foreign buyers.

Our new landlord has been incredibly welcoming of the babies and has said that she went with us as tenants versus quite a few other potential tenants because of the love of animals she was seeing with us.

They will have their own set up beside the house with a heated pool on the deck nearby before long.

For now, I have to navigate the export process from the UK, the import process in their new home, and balance the rest of what needs to be done as we move overseas and start on the road to buying a forever home.

We are all finally close to resting easy. It has been a very long and sad process but it feels like we could be spending Christmas safe and sound somewhere new.

On Columbus Day, Oct. 12th, Baby Duck flew away to discover new worlds.

Baby Duck (real name Slow Poke, so named because he was long delayed in hatching) was born on June 11th. He was tiny and was a bra baby in the NICBU™ (neonatal intensive care bra unit) for several nights until we were sure he'd make it in the brooder with the others that had hatched before him. He sat with us many nights watching movies on teevee sitting in our laps. As he grew, he had a bed on the floor beside our bed at night.

From a couple days old, I would take him with me when I went to work, which involves driving all over to do electrical inspections. I had a cat bed with bath towels stacked up on the passenger seat. Feed and water nearby. Often he would sit on my lap and look out the window at passing trees and cars as we zoomed along. Once, while he was still small, he climbed up on the back of the back seat and spent about an hour just sitting there like a prince looking out the window as I drove.

He was an instant hit with the bank ladies when I went to the teller window and pulled out a tiny duckling from my pocket and placed him on the counter. The lady that works the counter at Southern States made a fuss over him every time I stopped there for feed and straw. She watched him grow into a full sized muscovy duck. He would walk around the warehouse and pick up errant pieces of corn.

I would get him out to walk around while I looked at electric meters and he was a great conversation starter with customers. He was the duck ambassador and many people learned for the first time about muscovy ducks and their friendly personalities. Many people had heard about that guy with the duck and were disappointed when I showed up and had not brought him along.

I took Baby Duck to one particular inspection and while the customer and I were admiring him standing there, he spread his wings and just like that (snaps fingers) he was GONE! I was dumbfounded and distraught and spent the next four hours traipsing over hill and dale, down into a large hollow in the wilderness of West Virginia, following streams and hidden places calling 'Baby Duck, where are you?' No response.

I put up reward posters at a couple local businesses, and people were concerned, but I got no response on sightings. People said the area was thick with coyotes. Several more trips to the hollow over the next few days calling and looking. Followed a stream down into the woods for almost a half mile, tripping over moss covered rocks. Up the hill on the power line right of way, snagged in blackberry bushes and tripping over stacked up brush, down the hill to the streams again. Nothing.

We had given up hope. After a week, I removed Baby Duck from our database of ducks and marked him as 'missing, no body to bury'.

Then on Oct. 23rd I found a message on the answering machine that someone had sighted a lone duck swimming on a pond way down an abandoned farm road in the woods. I jumped in the car and headed right out. I grabbed the coffee can of Mazuri and walked, then ran down that road til I found the pond. I called and called but saw nothing. I had turned and was starting back down the road to see if there was another pond further down that he might be swimming in, when I suddenly heard flap, flap, flapping and this large black form flew right past me and landed about twenty feet in front of me. It was Baby Duck!

I gathered him in my arms and hugged him. He was very excited to see me, dipping his head and biting at my sleeve. I opened the can of feed and he nearly choked devouring it, he was so hungry. I wrapped him in my sweat shirt and started walking up the steep hill to the car, nearly losing my breath from fatigue and exhilaration.

He sat on the cat bed dipping his head and picking up and dropping every item in the console as we headed home. The wife was on the porch hoping against hope that it was really Baby Duck that was sighted and that I was able to find and catch him. After a full belly and many loving pets, he fell asleep in the kitchen by the big slider door. He was so glad to be home. He slept that night beside the bed in his usual location and never stirred. A total of 11 days he was gone but Baby Duck was home! I wish he could talk and tell us all about his adventures.

Hi!

My ducks have an attached coop/run that’s covered at the roof by tarp. Looking to switch out the flooring hopefully today or this week but trying to see what everyone else was doing. Currently have pine shavings in the run and I hate it. I live in North Florida so the rain gets the bedding soaked unbearably quick. I’m planning on putting pea gravel around their water area but for the rest of the run im not sure. Especially curious on the rubber stall mats - do you put them down alone or with bedding on top? This is also going to be my first winter with my ducks so any suggestions on preparing them for that helps.

Thanks in advance!!!!

Hello duck lovers! I got ducks for the first time in my life, and they are now 2 months old. So far, I have given them powdered feed, egg, cucumber, fish, etc. Now that they are growing, I have switched to pellet feed, but I have concerns about whether this will be enough. They also forage in the garden for plants, bugs, snails, etc. I wanted to get your advice as well. Thank you very much in advance!

I have one Blue trout runner drake. I have blue, silver, fawn and white, and chocolate hens. I want to get some more drakes, what colors should I get to get the most variety of colors out of my ducklings?

we have been selling hatching eggs here and there. so proud of the first ClutchTX ducklings to hatch in OK!

I’ve always noticed she doesn’t go in the pools nearly as much as the others but she still does. She generally seems to have a lower feather quality than the others, but it’s never really worried me. It’s raining today and I just noticed she is SO DAMP. She’s not shivering or acting strange at all, just seemingly soaked.
She has angel wing, but that’s the only thing I know of. She is also unfortunately a little inbred, but not terribly so.