I actually slept late today, I didn't wake up until 6:50am! Hey that is not half-bad since some days I wake up at 3:00am, here lately it has been 4:50am for the past week or so. I did very little today, cleaned brooders and the necessities of raising poultry, but not what we originally planned to do. We did not dig the holes and set the last two posts for the covered chicken run. I will get the tiller out tomorrow and try to reduce a hump of dirt where the front door of it needs to go...I just hope there isn't an old stump or burn pit there.
Our baby ducks make a really bad mess in their brooder, they were a big mess too...my husband decided they needed to go for a swim. It was really more of a bath because they are really to young to be in deep enough water to swim. A duck can drown, believe it or not...and baby ducks don't have feathers or the natural oils that make them basically waterproof. We kept a close eye on them and the water was maybe up to the bottom of their little bellies, but they seemed to enjoy splashing around and cleaning themselves up. We had them in our garden cart...then we put them back in the brooder and dumped the water out of the cart and put a layer of dry grass in the bottom of the cart. We put them in the sun for a bit to dry off and moved them into the shade and just watched them for hours. I took a lot of pictures of them, hey they are cute...what can I say?
The ducks love water, they play in their drinking water and it floods the bottom of the brooder...we sat there and brainstormed how we could fix the problem. I cut 1/4 inch hardware cloth to fit the bottom of the brooder and put three of these metal rods across the bottom to suspend the hardware cloth almost an inch above the brooder bottom. I then layered the pine shavings over the hardware cloth...then, I put their water inside of a dog bowl so the sides were higher to contain some of the water. I am keeping them in the office bathroom so I check on them often...so far, so good. I guess the true test will be tonight...because last night they drained their quart sized water container...I was using puppy pads, but they got soaked and get pretty disgusting with ten baby ducks pooping all night. Have I told you baby ducks are eating machines? All they do is eat, drink tons of water and poop...and sleep occasionally. They grow very fast and they need a lot of nutrition to support the size and weight gain. But, they will be big enough to go outside in a couple of weeks, the main thing is making sure they have what they need to survive this growing stage.
So basically today, we watched what we call "Duck TV" we sat in the shade with our cold water or iced tea and watched the babies most of the day. I came in the house and checked on the chicks hatching every once in awhile and Crew (my hubby) played frisbee with the dogs awhile. It was a great day of relaxation...he even cooked dinner. Oh, and now we have 3 little blond chicks and 5 black chicks so far...more pipping too. I also checked on our broody hen, she left the nest for a little while...she has been sitting on 18 eggs! I didn't put all of them under her...I imagine the other hens laid in the box.
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