A must for ducks is a bowl of water, not only to drink, which ducks do alot, especially ducklings, but also to wash out any feed that has gotten stuck to the nose or bill. It's an idea to get a water heater if you live in icy conditions. If your water bowl is having muddy problems look at the Feed page, there is a raised platform idea of my own that might help.
It's also important that the ground the ducks live on doesn't get too muddy, if you live on a farm or in a large area sure a little mud is fine, but for a backyard ducker, mud's not that brilliant, the reason being that ducks shove their bills into the watery mud and have a good wiggle around, siving all those little bugs and nutrients through the soil, thus making a very muddy unhealthy garden. If the area around their wading pool gets muddy, it will proberly become a muddy hole in a matter of days, not only is this not good for your garden, but stagnent pools of water that may form can kill your ducks if they drink from them. Ducks are very weak against moulds, and stangnant water is a nasty for them. An idea is to put your wading pool on pebbles so excess water drains, If this isn't possible you can place down chicken wire (with ends turned in so not to cut your duck's feet) all around the sides of the pool. |
