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Posted by Doug Miller on November 04, 2002 at 01:46:44:

In Reply to: my abandoned ducks posted by cathy41311 on November 03, 2002 at 20:42:15:

They need to experience swimming while still young-you hear stories of ducks as adults being afraid of the water because they never swam as ducklings (bad form for a duck I say!). But be careful they don't get hypothermia and don't stay in for, say, greater than 5-10 min. Muscovy ducklings can actually drown if the down gets soaked-they apparently get a lot of their down oil from their mother and since they don't have one they may easily get soaked. If they are too cold they won't even preen themselves until they warm up. If this happens gently towel them dry and set them under a lamp. Also, if you don't watch them the entire time make *SURE* there is a route by which they can climb out of the water. If the sides are unscalable they can easily drown
if their down gets soaked and they thus lose bouyancy.

Chicken starter is probably just fine all by itself but variety is always nice. They will probably be wary of new foods for a day or two but its fun to watch them fool around with it. Just be careful about sticking your nose in too far...literally...I was once watching some muscovys play with spinach with my nose just over the side of the box when the biggest male took aim, jumped, and scored a direct hit on the end of my nose. To add insult to injury he hung on for a second before dropping to the ground! I named him Nosy...

Here is an old post of mine with general advice.
http://forum.birdhobbyist.com/ducks/messages/831.html

-Doug

:I read on this site somewhere it is good to introduce the ducklings to water in a bath tub. Mine are almost 3 weeks old now and was wandering if they are old enough. Also they are eating chicken scratch, that is the closest thing I could get to waterfowl food in my area. I also have been giving them grass clippings. Is there anything else I should add to there diet. Thanks for everyones advice. Cathy

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