My lonely free ranging duck
In May the weather was becoming warm, sunny and pleasant and the duck was becoming too big for his indoor brooder cage so we decided it was time to start accustoming her to living outdoors. We had built a duck shed last year right next to the pond and the idea was for the duckling to take this as her new home.
At first, I used a makeshift cage to place the duckling into with some food and water so she could get used to seeing the outside world. I used two hula hoops to create a base and a top of this enclosure, some chicken wire mesh in between and on top and attached it all together with the trusty cable ties. It was an awesome little protective space which prevented the duck from escaping and kept her safe from our curious dogs but allowed her to observe and socialise with our free-ranging chickens and get used to the outside sights, sounds and temperatures.
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Improvised outdoor poultry cage: hula hoops and wire mesh
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Improvised outdoor poultry cage: hula hoops and wire mesh
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A few weeks of taking the duck outside in the morning and bringing her back at night and it was beginning to look a lot like true Orcadian summer - still windy and fairly cold, but sunny, green and lush everywhere you looked! We decided it was time to let the duckling sleep outside too! We showed her the pond but she couldn’t get out of it fast enough. Then we showed her the duck shed and she didn’t like that either instead choosing to sleep in our courtyard where it was more sheltered from the wind and we didn’t mind that at all. She was a free-ranging duck, free to choose what she does when she eats and where in our 2.5 acres of land she wanted to sleep.
The duck became good friends with the chickens, eating together, playing together, hissing at our rooster when he needed a gentle telling off. It was lovely to watch them all hang around like old pals in daytime only for the chickens to retire back to their coop for the night, leaving the duck alone in the courtyard. At this time we noticed her develop a slight angel wing deformity but she didn’t look in any pain or discomfort so there was no need to get alarmed. A slight genetic defect which only meant she couldn’t easily fly off and there was no need to clip her wings.
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As you can tell, we were still hoping the duck was female so that we could expect some eggs in July. I convinced myself that all the signs were right - the beak was slightly curved, there was no curled tail feather at the back and the quack sounded just right! It was a little gender identity transformation going on as I was so used to thinking of this bird as my little boy, now she was becoming a girl! It was so confusing, but it gave us hope for getting some tangible farm use from her/him!
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