The Ducks Chronicles Episode Ten – Out to the Big Play Pen
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In The Ducks Chronicles Episode Ten – Out to the Big Play Pen, it is time to go outside for the first time. They won’t be spending the night outside just yet but they will start spending all day light hours outside unless we get really bad weather.
The weight gain today was very modest they went from 5.33 to 5.57 ounces based on a 20 duck sample but this morning they were weighed for the first time before being fed so that made the number low compared to the previous day.
So far today all has been well except for being scared by the geese who were being pretty obnoxious until Charlie put them in their place.
I also show how the drain system comes apart for cleaning.
The panels that make up the pen are 8 footers you can get at Tractor Supply. http://bit.ly/1vsL0xH
The green plastic fencing came from Premier One Fencing; you can find it here http://bit.ly/16zAtFX
The reusable zip ties are a great tool for many things. These are the ones we use, http://amzn.to/1zAL114 these are six inches, you can get longer ones but make sure to get the ones that say Monoprice and that are rated to 50 lbs. The other ones on Amazon we have found were pretty crappy comparatively. They break faster and simply don’t work as well.
With out their mother duck they do not have the oils on their feathers to keep water proof until they get older. Yours look like they are doing fine, however, I killed a bunch of pekins accidently a couple years ago via hypothermia when I threw them in a pool to swim. I only had ten birds so perhaps yours can huddle and keep warm, but mine were outdoors on a warm summer day and all but two were dead by evening. I can’t think of anything else that would have killed them, but perhaps they had virus or something and the swim was the last straw.
Sad to see the chickens go but the ducks have been quite entertaining. I watch the episodes on the tv with chromecast with my wife and exchange student.
What a great idea with those cattle panels. I think I may start collecting a few at a time for when we get ready to make the goat pen….
you can easily see how much the ducklings have grown. Pretty amazing……