Duck Nest

I wasn't able to find too much information about how to build a Muscovy nest, seems they pretty much just pick a spot somewhere, anywhere, and away they go. But we've got turkey and roosters and lots of other chickens & ducks in the coop so I was worried if they did start laying that the eggs all might be crushed if they did try to rear some young.

So, I came up with this design & my wonderful hand-hubby got straight to work for me. Each box is 12"x12"x18", with the bottom piece being 22". The holes in the front are 8". The top is hinged & I grabbed whatever exterior paint was in the shop to give it a quick coat to protect the plywood. There are stabilizing bars in the corners and on one side and bottom of each divider piece.

So far, the ducks are terrified of the new box...

We went with 4 nests for 3 ducks in case one was being aggressive the other two could move a nest away from her. 

Hopefully they'll move in soon, they are edging on 6-7 months old, with the coop light on 16 hours/day for the chickens, they should start laying soon. So we'll have lots & lots & lots of duck eggs. Apparently they taste just like chicken eggs only bigger, but I've never had one before so should be interesting!

We're also going to let the ducks rears up some babies, but not too many. Muscovy are prolific breeders and it's very easy to find chicks for $5 each (or less) especially during the summer. I've read that muscovy meat also taste fantastic, but our local processor want $13 a bird, and that's just not reasonable (it has to do with the increased difficulty with de-feathering the ducks, obviously they just don't want the work). We were hoping to raise some ducks for meat, but until we find a better price for processing or it's not feasible.

The chicken tractor

There are tons of benefits to having your chickens outside, but per Ontario law, we're not allowed to free-range the chickens (plus with dogs/predators probably not a great idea). We're quite close to the road, with a pretty clear view of the pastures so decided to play by the rules (For now, I'll talk about that in another post).

So hubby built this fantastic chicken tractor!

 The whole thing cost us less then $15 because we built it from all the materials left by former owners. If I had to guess, I think we did it for under $100.


The frame is made by 1x6, re-enforced by L-brackets in each corner, and nailed together. Then we use electrical conduit (really any flexible plastic conduit would be fine, I've read using UV protected stuff is a really good idea) to create the three arches. Then stretched small-gauge wire from one side to the other, and on the ends. There is a door on this end (made out of wire so hard to see). The whole thing is very nice and light! You can see the handle, there are also wheels on the other side so we don't need to carry a dolly.

Right now I've been moving it about 2-3x time a day. Slowly getting it out of the sac paddock and into the main paddock to travel around. The chicks do a pretty good job of chewing up all the vegetation. We're also giving them some feed because we want them to be nice and fat ! Although we may stop doing that, depending on how things are.

This is a slightly smaller coop then you'd want for 50ish birds, but it's a good idea not to give them too much space or they run around and loose all their weight. If it turns out later that it isn't enough room, "we will not be free-ranging them. "

We need to make some hanging water-ers to make it easier to fill them/move the coop. Right now I feel like this song should be playing every time I try to move the chicken tractor...



Gotta be really careful not to run over any of the chickies!

Happy Ducks

We've got a whole 'naturalized' pond for the duckies when they get older, but for now they needed something in between the dog dish they had been swimming in (one at a time!) and the big pond. 

Found a 1" or so deep plastic water trough in the barn (totally useless for large animals, they'll just stick their feet in it and muck up the water!). So we dug a big hole in the chicken run and stuck'er in. There are some rocks in there just in case the duckies swim for too long & have a hard time getting out. 

They're pretty pleased with their new pad!