March 3, 2025

WaterfowlWisdom: Tips and Tales from the Poultry Keepers

Show Notes
Transcript

Thinking of Raising Ducks and Geese? Here’s What You Need to Know!

In this episode of The Intentional Poultry Keeper, we dive into the wisdom of waterfowl care—from feeding and housing to breeding and health management. Whether you're a backyard keeper, amateur breeder, or experienced poultry enthusiast, this episode is packed with practical tips and fascinating tales about ducks, geese, and mixed flocks!

What You’ll Learn in This Episode:

· The key differences between ducks, geese, and chickens

· Best feed and nutrition practices for healthy waterfowl

· How to keep duck bedding dry and coops clean

· The truth about water sources—how much do ducks and geese really need?

· Breeding behaviors and how to prevent common waterfowl health issues

Are Ducks or Geese Right for Your Flock? Let’s find out!

What’s your biggest challenge with raising ducks or geese? Drop us a comment!

Know a fellow poultry keeper who needs this info? Share this episode with them!

Timestamps

0:00 - Welcome to The Poultry Keepers Podcast
2:15 - Why waterfowl require different care than chickens
6:30 - The best feed and nutrition tips for ducks and geese
12:45 - Managing wet bedding and water access
18:00 - Understanding breeding behaviors in ducks and geese
23:30 - Common health issues and how to prevent them
30:00 - Final thoughts

Hashtags:

#WaterfowlWisdom #RaisingDucks #BackyardWaterfowl #PoultryKeepers #DucksAndGeese #WaterfowlBreeding #HomesteadPoultry #HealthyWaterfowl

You can email us at - poultrykeeperspodcast@gmail.com
Join our Facebook Groups:

Poultry Keepers Podcast -
https://www.facebook.com/groups/907679597724837
Poultry Keepers 360 - - https://www.facebook.com/groups/354973752688125
Poultry Breeders Nutrition - https://www.facebook.com/groups/4908798409211973

Check out the Poultry Kepers Podcast YouTube Channel -
https://www.youtube.com/@PoultryKeepersPodcast/featured

WEBVTT

00:00:00.050 --> 00:00:06.179
Welcome to another episode of the Poultry Keepers Podcast, where we talk poultry from Feathers to Function.

00:00:06.639 --> 00:00:11.949
In this episode Rip, Mandelyn, and John wrap up their conversation about waterfowl.

00:00:12.269 --> 00:00:13.839
So let's get right to it shall we.

00:00:13.919 --> 00:00:13.939
Yeah.

00:00:13.939 --> 00:00:15.519
Yeah.

00:00:23.867 --> 00:00:32.878
And another thing about water and ducks and geese is you can give them a clean container of water.

00:00:33.677 --> 00:00:44.628
And it seems like in a matter of minutes, they can have that thing, the water out of the water and all over the floor slung around, moved around and make a huge mess with it.

00:00:45.018 --> 00:00:46.307
Oh yeah, they're dirty birds.

00:00:46.847 --> 00:00:58.097
The one thing that I did find that worked fairly well, you can take a gallon can and get a piece of one inch thick lumber and cut a circle that will fit.

00:00:58.648 --> 00:01:07.487
fit down inside that can with about a quarter of an inch space on either side, and then drill a half inch hole in the center of that.

00:01:07.847 --> 00:01:15.447
That will allow them to tip that board down below the water level they can drink, but they can't get their head in there and sling it around and make a mess with it.

00:01:16.248 --> 00:01:22.808
So my solution was to get the flat backed buckets and clip them on the fence outside and feed them inside.

00:01:22.998 --> 00:01:24.388
So they go inside and they eat.

00:01:24.528 --> 00:01:24.778
Yeah.

00:01:24.927 --> 00:01:26.817
And then to make a mess, they have to go outside.

00:01:27.358 --> 00:01:30.138
And that really saved a lot on feed.

00:01:30.447 --> 00:01:34.308
It prevented them from being able to make the food and water slurry.

00:01:34.477 --> 00:01:43.177
Cause that stuff will spray six feet in every direction because they very much want to take a bite and then dabble in water, take a bite, dabble in water.

00:01:43.177 --> 00:01:48.218
And if you have your food next to your water source, it's going to get messy in a hurry.

00:01:49.018 --> 00:01:50.158
It doesn't take long.

00:01:50.177 --> 00:01:50.867
That's for sure.

00:01:51.617 --> 00:01:52.558
It doesn't take long.

00:01:52.587 --> 00:01:53.028
And they have

00:01:53.058 --> 00:01:54.087
wetter than.

00:01:54.888 --> 00:01:57.927
Their poops are wetter too because of all their water play.

00:01:58.578 --> 00:02:02.257
So I actually don't ever mix my waterfowl with my chickens.

00:02:02.257 --> 00:02:05.147
I keep them totally separate because that extra dampness.

00:02:05.947 --> 00:02:17.057
And speaking of waterfowl poop, if you ever let them free range around your house, invariably where they're going to want to go poop is on your sidewalk or your porch.

00:02:17.858 --> 00:02:19.427
And if you think chicken poop is slippery.

00:02:19.807 --> 00:02:20.367
Oh boy.

00:02:21.168 --> 00:02:25.798
That's why there's all these sayings about goose poop and duck poop.

00:02:26.598 --> 00:02:43.217
Yeah, I keep mine in their own space where they have their own pond their own water and inside their coop I've got to clean it probably two to three more times as often as I do for a chicken coop of the same size with the same number of birds just because of that dampness.

00:02:44.018 --> 00:02:48.008
Let's talk a little bit about nutrition for waterfowl.

00:02:48.807 --> 00:02:55.557
It's similar to chicken nutrition but they have additional requirements for proteins and some other things.

00:02:56.358 --> 00:03:00.448
Waterfowl, for example, have a higher requirement for niacin.

00:03:01.247 --> 00:03:04.168
They need much more niacin than chickens do.

00:03:04.448 --> 00:03:05.258
Yes, they do.

00:03:05.598 --> 00:03:07.877
They have to have that supplemented in their feed.

00:03:08.677 --> 00:03:10.448
And they can't have medicated feed?

00:03:10.587 --> 00:03:11.108
No.

00:03:11.907 --> 00:03:28.318
They can't have the feed with the coccidiosis, coccidiostat in it because the coccidiostat helps prevent coccidiosis, because it binds up nice and it's not available to the little OO system.

00:03:28.687 --> 00:03:29.668
To cause problems.

00:03:30.247 --> 00:03:37.078
So by binding up the niacin, it just really short changes and it can kill your ducks if you'd feed them that stuff.

00:03:37.877 --> 00:03:44.627
It also inhibits niacin and thiamine uptake as well, which are two critical amino acids for development.

00:03:44.627 --> 00:03:46.087
So don't do it

00:03:46.888 --> 00:03:48.358
now when you're growing the

00:03:48.358 --> 00:03:50.207
Especially

00:03:51.008 --> 00:04:01.117
the Pekin or the other large fast growing types They are probably the soonest to show with a niacin deficiency because of that accelerated growth that they have.

00:04:01.288 --> 00:04:06.367
Yes Yeah, waterfowl do grow exceptionally fast when you compare it to a chicken

00:04:07.168 --> 00:04:07.298
They

00:04:07.298 --> 00:04:13.377
can go from a brand new baby duckling to a nearly full grown duck in just a matter of weeks.

00:04:14.177 --> 00:04:15.258
It doesn't take them long.

00:04:16.057 --> 00:04:25.937
They have a protein, a little bit higher protein requirements than chickens do probably 20 to 22 percent for waterfowl.

00:04:26.737 --> 00:04:34.317
Overall probably closer to 24, 26 percent for ducklings, which that would be far too much for chickens.

00:04:35.117 --> 00:04:42.083
In their natural forage, they're looking for crustaceans and snails and those higher protein tidbits, and then they

00:04:42.372 --> 00:04:42.593
Yeah.

00:04:42.632 --> 00:04:48.382
Eat a little greens, but they're mainly after those higher protein snacks.

00:04:49.112 --> 00:04:53.572
Another thing to remember when you're raising waterfowl is brooding them.

00:04:54.103 --> 00:04:59.583
They don't require as high temperatures as chickens do.

00:04:59.593 --> 00:05:03.302
Most chickens, they recommend starting out at 95 degrees.

00:05:03.723 --> 00:05:10.452
Ducks, you're going to be closer to 90 degrees, but, and they also don't need warmth as long as chickens do.

00:05:10.502 --> 00:05:16.682
We were just talking about how fast Young waterfowl grow and they can get really big on you real quick.

00:05:17.483 --> 00:05:18.843
Yes, they will.

00:05:19.052 --> 00:05:23.052
But it is important to note that when they first hatch, they're not waterproof yet.

00:05:23.362 --> 00:05:23.492
No.

00:05:23.533 --> 00:05:33.333
And you don't want to encourage swimming before they start getting that oil gland activated and preening themselves to get that oil coating.

00:05:33.802 --> 00:05:41.843
Cause if you take a freshly hatched duckling and put it in water, it'll start to sink because it doesn't have that oil coating to help with the buoyancy.

00:05:42.437 --> 00:05:44.447
And they can get chilled really easy.

00:05:45.007 --> 00:05:51.158
So you can give them a little splash pad so that they start printing, but I don't even worry about giving them a.

00:05:51.937 --> 00:05:54.767
Water play area until after two weeks old.

00:05:55.567 --> 00:05:57.348
Yeah, and they can make a huge mess with it.

00:05:57.348 --> 00:05:59.067
It doesn't take them

00:05:59.067 --> 00:06:01.908
But it's so fun to watch them.

00:06:01.927 --> 00:06:02.398
Oh, I know

00:06:02.708 --> 00:06:06.497
it's a lot of fun I did it when we first got our cotton patch goslings.

00:06:06.517 --> 00:06:17.418
They were about four weeks old and we put them in a actually what it was a gator pond over at the state fairgrounds and we put them in there so they'd have access to that pond, which was deep.

00:06:17.418 --> 00:06:18.468
It was about eight feet deep.

00:06:19.267 --> 00:06:23.197
And to watch those things, they would go underwater and they'd actually fly underwater with their wings.

00:06:23.197 --> 00:06:24.478
They had a ball doing that.

00:06:25.278 --> 00:06:31.317
But breeding waterfowl that's a little bit different than breeding chickens, particularly if you're breeding geese.

00:06:32.117 --> 00:06:36.108
They prefer to have a long term pair bonding.

00:06:37.408 --> 00:06:49.877
And they don't do well in a flock mating situation like you would do with regular ducks or chickens, but they usually one pair of geese that you can't get more females in there with them.

00:06:50.267 --> 00:06:56.367
Most of them, ducks, you can do a little bit more than that, but and, we talked about this earlier.

00:06:56.418 --> 00:06:59.937
They're going to require access to clean water.

00:07:00.627 --> 00:07:26.343
For successful mating and egg collection, it is difficult, and I'm being real generous when I say difficult, to keep waterfowl eggs clean, they can be really dirty, waterfowl has this tendency for water and dirt and mud, and that very easily transfers to eggs that are in the nest, so they can get in the nest.

00:07:26.502 --> 00:07:30.012
you can have really grubby looking eggs in short order.

00:07:30.812 --> 00:07:34.192
It doesn't seem to affect them much once it's hatching time.

00:07:34.612 --> 00:07:35.992
Surprisingly it does not.

00:07:36.492 --> 00:07:37.622
It really does not.

00:07:38.423 --> 00:07:55.502
When I still lived in an urban area I had a little handful of ducks and I was trying to make that work in an urban setting so I, we built this fancy run that had a kiddie pool with a drain installed that was elevated on a gravel bed.

00:07:55.932 --> 00:08:02.942
So all I had to do was go hose off that poo, and then I had clean gravel, there was no mud, the eggs were spotless.

00:08:03.403 --> 00:08:09.822
But what I didn't account for is every time I hosed off that gravel, all that poo and water just sunk.

00:08:10.622 --> 00:08:15.083
And that next season Ooh, that is stinky.

00:08:15.793 --> 00:08:16.612
We had to dismantle

00:08:16.833 --> 00:08:17.702
the whole thing.

00:08:18.093 --> 00:08:18.423
Yeah.

00:08:18.423 --> 00:08:18.733
Sink and sink.

00:08:19.533 --> 00:08:20.112
The fly

00:08:20.122 --> 00:08:24.783
breeding going on in that moisture as it had built up from the season before.

00:08:25.192 --> 00:08:25.473
Yeah.

00:08:25.473 --> 00:08:27.572
That was a great idea for about a month.

00:08:28.302 --> 00:08:31.603
You need a rotating paddock design if you're going to do this.

00:08:31.663 --> 00:08:40.932
There's a lot of things to consider about keeping things clean and sanitary you were talking about growth rates though and these are pretty amazing.

00:08:41.488 --> 00:08:48.528
Critters and the way that they can be well managed looking at a feed conversion ratio, like anywhere from 2.

00:08:48.528 --> 00:08:51.908
5 to 3 is not too shabby.

00:08:52.097 --> 00:08:54.707
It's incredible when you stop and think about it.

00:08:54.707 --> 00:08:55.388
It really is.

00:08:55.388 --> 00:08:55.465
It's

00:08:56.264 --> 00:08:57.195
1 thing

00:08:57.245 --> 00:08:58.174
we haven't heritage

00:08:58.264 --> 00:08:58.695
poultry.

00:08:58.695 --> 00:09:00.404
I hope to get a 5 to 1.

00:09:00.404 --> 00:09:02.684
It's more like 4 to 1 in my record keeping.

00:09:03.115 --> 00:09:08.934
So if a good way to put on a lot of meat fast is waterfowl, but your infrastructure needs to be able to support it.

00:09:09.735 --> 00:09:11.674
1 thing we haven't talked about.

00:09:12.475 --> 00:09:17.054
Health of waterfowl and by and large they're pretty healthy.

00:09:17.445 --> 00:09:18.615
Yeah, they're pretty resilient.

00:09:18.615 --> 00:09:20.105
There's not much that phases them

00:09:20.904 --> 00:10:03.024
You've got, particularly with some of the bigger heavier breeds, you've got to watch for leg problems, respiratory infections are another common thing, parasite issues can be another one, I'm going to get on my soapbox here for just a minute, there is a problem In waterfowl called angel wing and what angel wing is it's where the last joint of the wing those feathers grow so fast that they cannot support them so that flops out the bottom of the ring wing drops out or turns outside this is not I repeat this is not the same thing as a split wing.

00:10:03.825 --> 00:10:05.205
Chickens have split wings.

00:10:05.575 --> 00:10:07.355
Waterfowl have angel wings.

00:10:08.154 --> 00:10:15.335
But I don't know why folks started calling split wings and chicken angel wing, but it's not the same thing.

00:10:16.054 --> 00:10:29.544
There is a lot of evidence that suggests that angel wing and waterfowl is caused by high levels of protein in their diet because it grows so fast.

00:10:30.345 --> 00:10:40.320
I am of the opinion that there has to be a genetic propensity or a tendency for those birds to get angel wing.

00:10:41.009 --> 00:10:45.789
But the nutrition and diet is definitely a contributing factor to it.

00:10:46.590 --> 00:10:52.769
And I've got a, I haven't posted it yet, but I'm going to be posting an article here in the next few days.

00:10:52.769 --> 00:10:57.919
It's in this week's rotation on angel wing and what you can do about it.

00:10:58.720 --> 00:11:07.365
But it's basically just You know, these things are growing so fast and you got to watch their protein uptake.

00:11:07.465 --> 00:11:09.705
Don't go too crazy like we do with chicken sometimes.

00:11:10.504 --> 00:11:11.595
We talked about temperament.

00:11:12.394 --> 00:11:14.884
What about their flight ability?

00:11:15.134 --> 00:11:17.684
I know heavy ducks and heavy geese.

00:11:17.684 --> 00:11:23.134
They can't fly, not for any distance, but the smaller they get.

00:11:23.884 --> 00:11:28.115
The more likely it is that they actually can take off and fly.

00:11:28.914 --> 00:11:30.664
Call ducks can fly, can't they?

00:11:30.664 --> 00:11:30.924
They

00:11:31.144 --> 00:11:32.544
can fly like a quail.

00:11:33.345 --> 00:11:33.684
Mine

00:11:33.684 --> 00:11:35.225
were what do they call that, pinioned?

00:11:35.855 --> 00:11:37.304
That's another good thing to talk about.

00:11:38.154 --> 00:11:38.934
Even geese.

00:11:39.309 --> 00:11:41.610
Some breeds of geese are exceptional flyers.

00:11:42.269 --> 00:12:04.840
Those cotton patch geese we got when we got when we took them out of where we had been brooding them, and they were up pretty much adult size and were just feathering in, we put them in a, just an open pasture like environment thing there at the museum, and one of them immediately took off and flew completely out of sight, never to be seen again.

00:12:05.465 --> 00:12:06.544
Nature finds a way.

00:12:07.345 --> 00:12:09.654
And they were bigger than a duck for sure.

00:12:09.695 --> 00:12:13.085
They were good size, even large ducks Muscovies.

00:12:13.764 --> 00:12:14.975
They're pretty good flyers too.

00:12:15.774 --> 00:12:23.345
I was told by a Muscovy breeder that if you have hens at one year old that can still fly, they're a cull because they're not heavy enough.

00:12:24.144 --> 00:12:29.264
If they're good quality, they can't fly after a year old because they've got weight to hold them down.

00:12:30.065 --> 00:12:30.865
That's for sure.

00:12:31.004 --> 00:12:31.654
That's for sure.

00:12:32.095 --> 00:12:40.955
Several years ago, a friend of mine found a Canada goose left abandoned in a parking lot in a big mall area, just one little gosling.

00:12:41.745 --> 00:12:44.950
And she asked, What she should do with it.

00:12:44.950 --> 00:12:49.460
And I was like ideally it gets raised with other geese and transition back to a wild lifestyle.

00:12:49.950 --> 00:12:54.139
She was like I can't do that, but I had a batch of babies the same age.

00:12:54.139 --> 00:13:00.009
So I took it and she grew up, hit flight age.

00:13:00.639 --> 00:13:08.519
And when they would take off running across the field, she gained her first flight and she probably got 30, 40 foot up in the air.

00:13:09.044 --> 00:13:14.980
And I was watching her and I saw her head looking down going, Holy crap! I

00:13:14.980 --> 00:13:16.144
can

00:13:16.144 --> 00:13:19.674
fly! And then she crash landed right into the fence.

00:13:20.475 --> 00:13:21.924
That's an acquired skill.

00:13:22.745 --> 00:13:28.205
I enjoy watching parents teach their Goslings to fly out on the pond across from us.

00:13:28.304 --> 00:13:32.445
It's pretty neat the way they flap just over the water and they splash the water with their wings.

00:13:33.245 --> 00:13:37.075
And they'll just do that two or three times with the goslings in a little group watching.

00:13:37.125 --> 00:13:38.725
They're just showing them, Hey, this is how we do it.

00:13:38.784 --> 00:13:39.565
This is how we do it.

00:13:40.365 --> 00:13:42.764
And then a couple of days later, they're off.

00:13:43.565 --> 00:13:46.054
Madeline, you were talking about crash landing.

00:13:46.585 --> 00:13:47.414
And I think.

00:13:48.134 --> 00:13:54.754
Most of us are probably familiar with that old quote that any landing you can walk away from is a good landing.

00:13:55.554 --> 00:13:57.855
And I saw a picture that illustrated it perfectly.

00:13:57.855 --> 00:14:05.414
It had that quote on it, but what the picture was, you could see two skid lines through, it was light snow through the snow across the coast.

00:14:05.784 --> 00:14:12.855
Top of the frozen lake and they came to a stop and you saw these little goose feet walking away from it.

00:14:13.654 --> 00:14:15.174
Yeah, that happens

00:14:15.174 --> 00:14:18.764
in the spring when the migratory waterfowl come back and we haven't iced out yet.

00:14:19.565 --> 00:14:20.384
It's pretty funny.

00:14:21.184 --> 00:14:23.205
Yeah, that gave me a chuckle when I saw that.

00:14:24.004 --> 00:14:30.404
But, if you're interested in getting started with Waterfowl, get, it's the same way as getting started in chickens.

00:14:30.404 --> 00:14:32.245
Find someone who can mentor you.

00:14:32.794 --> 00:14:35.745
You will do much, much better with that help.

00:14:36.205 --> 00:14:41.625
Also, if you can locate someone, that you want to get a start from.

00:14:42.475 --> 00:14:52.205
That, that's a good person to ask to mentor you and finding good waterfowl is the same techniques, the same thing as involved in finding good chickens.

00:14:52.804 --> 00:15:02.225
So if you have the space and if you feel like you're up to the management task and you want some waterfowl, by all means get somebody and give it a try.

00:15:02.254 --> 00:15:03.524
They are a lot of fun.

00:15:04.325 --> 00:15:06.274
They have a smartness to them.

00:15:06.284 --> 00:15:07.365
That's pretty neat too.

00:15:07.394 --> 00:15:14.434
There's been a couple of times over the years where people reached out to me to see if I would take their one duck.

00:15:14.434 --> 00:15:16.865
And these are people who didn't have chickens.

00:15:17.664 --> 00:15:19.105
They were not prepared.

00:15:19.605 --> 00:15:22.404
And this poor little duck had to grow up with dogs.

00:15:22.735 --> 00:15:26.154
It's happened two or three times now, but two times stand out in my mind.

00:15:26.820 --> 00:15:29.340
One duck, she thought she was a poodle.

00:15:29.909 --> 00:15:32.429
The other duck, she thought she was a German Shepherd.

00:15:33.230 --> 00:15:42.740
And I had German Shepherds and bringing those ducks home, they were separate from each other, and introducing them to my ducks.

00:15:43.539 --> 00:15:49.684
I first started by letting them meet my dogs because my dogs are responsible and They could handle being around a new bird.

00:15:50.485 --> 00:15:51.884
And then I would let my ducks out.

00:15:52.684 --> 00:15:58.465
And the look that they got on their face when they saw ducks getting in the pool and playing for the first time.

00:15:59.085 --> 00:16:01.595
They hung with my dogs for a week.

00:16:01.884 --> 00:16:07.865
But at the end of that week, both of them figured out the exact same time after a full week, you know what?

00:16:08.315 --> 00:16:09.654
I might actually be a duck.

00:16:10.455 --> 00:16:10.674
Oh

00:16:11.284 --> 00:16:11.995
my goodness.

00:16:12.794 --> 00:16:14.014
And you know they are smart.

00:16:14.014 --> 00:16:15.225
And particularly geese.

00:16:16.024 --> 00:16:18.825
I have seen our cotton patch geese over there at the museum.

00:16:19.625 --> 00:16:23.404
They would encounter something that was a little strange or they weren't sure of.

00:16:24.205 --> 00:16:30.014
And they would stop, and they would stare at it, and they would tilt their head to one side, and then to the other.

00:16:30.815 --> 00:16:36.475
I wonder if this is something that I could maybe put to good use, or I could eat it, or whatever it is.

00:16:36.715 --> 00:16:41.595
And they, you can just almost see the gears turning inside their head.

00:16:42.394 --> 00:16:49.934
Yeah, you can see those little gears turning and because of that, I would highly suggest against raising one.

00:16:50.735 --> 00:16:52.075
If you're going to do it, get a flock,

00:16:52.684 --> 00:16:52.955
at least

00:16:53.004 --> 00:16:53.345
three.

00:16:53.754 --> 00:16:55.004
They're they're just like chickens.

00:16:55.004 --> 00:16:55.904
They're flock animals.

00:16:55.945 --> 00:16:57.654
They do better in that environment.

00:16:58.375 --> 00:17:03.945
So this Easter, if someone gives you one duck, either find a flock for it or go get another.

00:17:04.744 --> 00:17:06.605
Don't torture them and make them think they're dogs.

00:17:07.404 --> 00:17:09.275
Yeah, it's not too good when they chase cars.

00:17:09.339 --> 00:17:11.460
That's been my experience down in Memphis.

00:17:11.480 --> 00:17:16.980
Every public park seems to have a flock of feral waterfowl.

00:17:17.019 --> 00:17:17.490
Oh, they're not

00:17:17.650 --> 00:17:18.009
feral.

00:17:18.019 --> 00:17:18.779
They're dumped.

00:17:18.809 --> 00:17:23.710
Those are people doing the exact opposite of finding them responsible homes.

00:17:23.710 --> 00:17:29.619
They're taking domestic animals and putting them in a wild situation that they are not prepared for.

00:17:30.079 --> 00:17:33.720
Yeah, so they're chasing you through the Kroger parking lot.

00:17:34.269 --> 00:17:38.329
First, they back up traffic because they come across the street from behind the park.

00:17:39.130 --> 00:17:44.700
And backup traffic in both directions for about 5 minutes and then they chase people around the Kroger parking lot.

00:17:45.500 --> 00:17:50.250
We've got that problem here and where I live in Lakeland, Florida, except it's Publix, right?

00:17:50.589 --> 00:17:50.960
That's the only

00:17:50.960 --> 00:17:51.299
difference.

00:17:52.150 --> 00:17:56.890
We have 1 lake called Lake Mirror and all the dump ducks wind up there.

00:17:57.690 --> 00:18:01.230
There's ducks and geese and swans.

00:18:02.029 --> 00:18:11.220
Now, the swans were the only Birds that were brought in legitimately and they were a gift from Queen Elizabeth sent six pairs of mute swans over here.

00:18:12.019 --> 00:18:25.150
I don't know how many swans they've raised over the years, but now they got the mute swans, the black neck swans, the black swans, but it's the place to go and hang out with Waterfowl if you're interested.

00:18:25.950 --> 00:18:27.420
Real popular with little kids.

00:18:28.220 --> 00:18:33.470
If I want to fill in the southern leg of my Sibley's Birds East book, I'll know a stop.

00:18:34.269 --> 00:18:34.829
There you go.

00:18:35.630 --> 00:18:36.039
Bring my

00:18:36.470 --> 00:18:37.000
binoculars.

00:18:37.799 --> 00:18:40.890
Guys, that's all that I have to go over.

00:18:40.890 --> 00:18:46.059
Anything that you guys have, or you have a question maybe I could answer, I don't know.

00:18:46.750 --> 00:18:53.990
I feel like we covered quite a bit, and My only parting words is think long and hard.

00:18:53.990 --> 00:18:56.569
If you want to double your chore load by having ducks.

00:18:56.609 --> 00:18:57.000
Yeah,

00:18:57.240 --> 00:18:59.599
they are more than what a chicken needs.

00:19:00.400 --> 00:19:06.579
Keeping ducks is not just all ducky and I'll just leave it at that.

00:19:06.579 --> 00:19:08.259
And if they're going to be entertaining

00:19:08.259 --> 00:19:10.599
birds, they are definitely entertaining.

00:19:10.799 --> 00:19:11.509
They're great.

00:19:11.519 --> 00:19:11.650
They

00:19:11.650 --> 00:19:13.099
have wonderful personalities.

00:19:13.259 --> 00:19:13.920
They really do.

00:19:14.420 --> 00:19:14.650
Yeah.

00:19:14.819 --> 00:19:19.420
And don't share a waterfront property with domestic and native.

00:19:19.420 --> 00:19:19.460
Yeah.

00:19:19.640 --> 00:19:23.230
Waterfowl because they don't mix when you start mixing all the

00:19:23.279 --> 00:19:24.289
yeah, this is true,

00:19:24.569 --> 00:19:25.869
Vectors together.

00:19:26.670 --> 00:19:32.220
Thankfully, we don't have a pond or anything to encourage wild visits at most.

00:19:32.240 --> 00:19:37.049
We might get a blue heron back in the creek, but they stay outside of our fence.

00:19:37.660 --> 00:19:45.660
Cause if the, especially with the AI concerns float around with the avian influenza, that's largely being transported around by wild

00:19:46.460 --> 00:19:46.950
waterfowl.

00:19:47.190 --> 00:19:54.599
So you don't want them hanging out in your yard if they're wild and keep your domestic separate for sure.

00:19:55.220 --> 00:19:55.849
Absolutely.

00:19:56.420 --> 00:19:56.440
Yeah.

00:19:56.940 --> 00:19:58.259
That's a genuine concern.

00:19:58.259 --> 00:20:02.150
Be precautious and be safe, but they're delicious.

00:20:02.670 --> 00:20:02.960
Raisin.

00:20:03.704 --> 00:20:06.025
If you can't absolutely they taste a lot of fun

00:20:06.125 --> 00:20:06.565
remain

00:20:07.365 --> 00:20:08.434
Okay, rip sign us out.

00:20:08.944 --> 00:20:18.694
All right, everybody we've had a lot of fun today and we hope you have too we'll be back with you Every tuesday bright and early at 12 a.

00:20:18.694 --> 00:20:19.424
m in the morning.

00:20:19.795 --> 00:20:30.045
So if you're up early Catch us then but until then you guys keep having fun and keep raising your birds and above all keep enjoying your birds.

00:20:30.105 --> 00:20:31.595
Happy poultry keeping everybody.