This rope looks huge for her in this video – taken around June 24th when I hired her to help work the farm 😉 -, but only a couple weeks later and she has almost doubled in size. I’m sure she’s at 30lbs by now. She is supposed to end up around 80-100lbs. Her parents were big and tall, but not huge. It’s hard to say, but her feet are very big. She’s definitely going to keep growing fast over the next year.
More ducks in the pool time!
Just another video watching and listening to the ducks splash around in the pool. It’s nice and relaxing to watch and listen to. 🙂 No eggs yet, but hopefully in a couple of months I will have lots!
New Livestock Guardian Dog in Training: Bella!
Meet Bella! She is a livestock guardian dog breed. She came from working parents on a farm over by Plymouth. Her mother is a registered Anatolian Shepherd and her father is a purebred Maremma Sheepdog. Mom and I went to look at the pups and picked her up a few weeks back! She is growing like a weed. 26lbs at her first vet appointment last week and only 13 weeks old! Her mom was tall and slender and her dad a little shorter and chunkier so it will be interesting to see where she lands.
We do obedience training at least twice a day, leash walks at least once a day. She gets brushing a few times a week at least and I try to play with her paws and put my fingers in her mouth/look at her teeth often so she grows used to being held, poked, prodded, etc so she won’t be fearful of the vet. Overall she is very calm, doesn’t challenge fences, and really doesn’t pay the ducks much attention (which is what you want!). She will be 14 weeks old this weekend. She is still a pup of course and has lots of ropes and chews and such to help get her excess energy out. Phew it’s work! I really wish I would have adopted her brother when I got her so she had a pup to get her energy out on. LOL Someday soon hopefully I’ll find another to join her. Gotta work on some more fencing first! Hobby farm work is never done! But that is part of the joy in life 🙂
Ducks, hose, and clean pool!
It’s been awhile since I’ve remembered to post, but I thought I’d give a nice update! Ducks definitely love water. OF COURSE! Check out the video below for some ducks playing in the water soothing sounds! They love being sprayed by the hose as well as playing in their pool. I knew they loved water, but didn’t know they would actually enjoy being sprayed by the hose! Ha! 🙂
None are laying right now sadly. I adopted a couple of older ducks that were, but they stopped when I adopted my livestock guardian dog Bella. It was right around that time. But they were also molting which I also read can make them stop laying. Not sure if it was timing or coincidence? But they all seem to trust Bella now and don’t run from her so I’m hoping to at least start getting a couple eggs a day from the older two soon. The rest won’t start laying until September/October or so. Can’t wait!
Enjoy the duck splashing pool time! 🙂
New Silver Appleyard Females in the brooder!
Picked up 4 silver Appleyard females that are almost 7 weeks old yesterday! They are in the brooder for the week and will hopefully get to go out into the foraging yard next weekend after my khaki girls have been able to run around for a bit there themselves so it’s a more neutral meeting space. If all goes well, I will be picking up a couple of Indian Runner mixes that are 2 years old an already laying the following weekend to transfer to the brooder for a week and then slowly integrate. That way I will get eggs for the summer! 🙂
See new silver Appleyard ladies below!
Ducks 6.5 weeks and their new fenced run!
I was finally able to put up the fence and gate this weekend for the outdoor foraging space. I wrapped it around my outdoor fenced space that the dogs have so that the ducks can eat all the bugs and keep them from the dogs. They are natural pest control 😀
The ducks are in their outdoor pens with the pool now and will be there about a week. Next weekend, I plan to open the door and let them wonder out in the foraging space and then let the new silver Appleyard females out of their brooder and into the yard as well.
Hopefully there will be no issues since everyone is still pretty young and about the same age. Hoping they will accept eachother easily. 🙏
Pics below!
Ducks 7 weeks old & first pool swim!
Ducklings 5 weeks old!
Yesterday, May 16th they turned 5 weeks old! Getting closer to fully feathered and moving out to the outside pens and having their pool filled! Last weekend it was really warm so I put up a barrier and opened the big garage door so that they could get some air, but I knew there was some chilly weather coming so they couldn’t have a pool yet. They can get easily chilled when they aren’t fully feathered.
Some photos below also of their new outdoor pens. Most of the predator proofing is done (lots of hardware cloth on the steel pens!) however I still have to cover sharp pieces with duct tape, build their pool deck, and put their tarp and bedding into the duck house/shed. It’s coming along though!
Ducklings 4 weeks old!
They are getting so big! This post is a little late since 4 weeks was on May 9th, but I’ve been doing a lot more yardwork now that spring/summer is blooming and trying to finish predator proofing the pens.
Enjoy!
Ducklings enjoying evening salad night night treat :)
I give the girls some shredded spring salad mix at night before lights out and they adore it as you can see! We will be trying frozen peas soon too.