Look what I found outside my door!

[Starsider]

My husband and I live in a townhouse community that boasts a pretty nice lake. There are all kinds of animals running around, and we love it, especially the ducks. We're not big fans of the mallards, but we LOVE the muscovy ducks. They're friendly, and almost dog-like. One mother duck seems to have "adopted" us- she follows my husband when he's out by the lake, and she decided to make her nest by our back door. Of course, my husband adores her, to the point where he cobbled together a windbreak for her, and he put out a dish of water on hot days.

So after what seemed like forever (35 days to hatch a muscovy), we woke up this morning to a nest full of ducklings!

Here she is sitting on her nest about two weeks ago. She actually allows us to touch her on the tail (lightly).

Babies!! The bread chunks are from my husband (he was trying to get Mama's attention so she'd look at his camera for pics)

The hubby getting some video with his tablet

 

[skysthelimit]

She is beautiful and so are the babies.

 

[Miss M]

Oh, how sweet! :razz:

Those little ducklings are going to be so much fun to watch grow up!

 

[3mina]

That's tons better than the indigents I occasionally found outside my door, before I got the dogs

 

[fuzzy9]

AWWWWWWW!!!!!!!!!!! How adorable are those little babies!!!

 

[concreteblonde]

Those are so cute! I want ducks but boyfriend says no. The neighbors have them and they are noisy. Glad you got you some.

Concrete Blonde

 

[Starsider]

Concreteblonde, once you get to know a really awesome breed like Muscovies, they are wonderful to have around! My husband and I weren't "bird people" until this mama showed up, and now we're looking at having our own small pet flock when we move and have a bit more space.

If your boyfriend is worried about them being noisy, Muscovy ducks are often called the "quackless" duck The females make a soft cooing/trilling noise, the males make a very quiet, rhythmic hissing noise when they're excited or mackin' with the lady ducks :lol:

 

[concreteblonde]

Concreteblonde, once you get to know a really awesome breed like Muscovies, they are wonderful to have around! My husband and I weren't "bird people" until this mama showed up, and now we're looking at having our own small pet flock when we move and have a bit more space.

If your boyfriend is worried about them being noisy, Muscovy ducks are often called the "quackless" duck The females make a soft cooing/trilling noise, the males make a very quiet, rhythmic hissing noise when they're excited or mackin' with the lady ducks :lol:

LOL! Well, it's not just the quacking, it's also the duck poop. Seems his parents had ducks at one time and they were always doo-dooing up the place.

I'll have to live without them...and guinee hens too. Can't complain too much he's talking about getting goats. I want miniature goats!

Summer sausage is good.

 

[Miss M]

I'll have to live without them...and guinee hens too. Can't complain too much he's talking about getting goats. I want miniature goats!

Summer sausage is good.

Hmmmm... interesting line of thought you had going there! :lol:

 

[Mary Ann's Rabbitry]

awww. I like ducks. I thought that was very nice of your husband to leave her there and hatch out her babies. She looks like a proud mom. Thanks for sharing.

 

[curlysue]

Aww soo cute.we used too raise muscovys.usualy they are very protective mothers.

 

[Cattle Cait]

How adorable!

 

[OneAcreFarm]

That is so great! Thanks for sharing!

 

[tnelsonfla]

Where we live we have several Muscovies around our area. Unfortunately they have a low success ratio when compared to the Mallards. The Muscoviuos lose about 90% of the ducklings hatched and the Mallards seem to have 75% of there ducklings make it to adulthood. Let us know how they do.

 

[WildWolf]

Awww... wish I could raise ducks!

 

[Peach]

I purchased a pair of muscovy ducks for insect control and they had done a great job. They have become friendly as they have figured out we bring them treats now and then and table scraps. Otherwise, they are pretty much free-range ducks. They are still in the process of loosing their duckling feathers but almost adults. When do they start laying eggs? They roam the back yard throughout the day to find food, and return to the garden at night, which we lock up, and repeat the process the next day.Thinking of using their eggs for food purposes, rather than actually hatching them (no incubator) and not sure what environment they need to hatch eggs naturally. We are hoping one is a male and the other is a female.

 

[tnelsonfla]

When do they start laying eggs?

From my experience is seems to take about 10-12 months before they start laying eggs. At around 4-6 months age you should see a visible difference between the male and female.

 

[Starsider]

Tnelson, I've noticed the low success rate too. There have been about 3-4 clutches of them that hatched out, and it seems like within 2 weeks they're all gone. In the few months we've been here I haven't noticed a single Muscovy duckling make it to adulthood, whereas we have plenty of baby, "teen", and sub-adult mallards and geese running around. More than a few predators in the area - raccoons, foxes, feral cats, hawks, snakes, and we have a couple of huge snapping turtles in the lake.

 

[Cindi Davis]

Those are awful cute

 

[MamaSheepdog]

How is the little family doing now? Are the ducklings sex-linked? Some have brown on them and others are yellow.