If you decide to breed ducks, the first thing you need to understand is in what conditions to keep and what to feed the duckling.
Chick Conditions
If there is no brood hen, the premises for the newly hatched chicks must be necessarily heated, with sufficient air and light. The temperature in the rooms should be constant and regulated only depending on the age of the kids. As litter, use small chips, which in the first few days are covered with corrugated cardboard. They can be released for walking a few days after birth.
How and what to feed the duckling. Basic Rules
Ducklings grow very quickly, unlike other poultry. Only a few months, and just recently, the hatched chick became like an adult. The thing is that the feed for these birds contains a lot of nutrients, and, in addition, these birds eat quite a lot and often. It is only necessary to properly compile their diet. Food must contain nitrogenous and mineral substances, as well as vitamins.
How to feed newborn ducklings?
A prerequisite for proper nutrition of babies is friable food. Five days after the babies hatch, they should be given a moistened mixture of eggs, which must be finely chopped, grain flour, sifted, cottage cheese and finely chopped greens. They are fed on special boards that need to be washed and dried daily. Also, in addition to water, you need to use yogurt. It is poured into drinking bowls. Access to drinking bowls is limited so that the calves have the opportunity to dip only their beak into it and are unable to climb there entirely. After a few days, you need to add more yogurt to the feed mixture and gradually increase the proportion of greens. Also, in a separate feeder, it is necessary to pour river sand. If conditions permit, the chicks are given nettles and greens. They also use ponds in which they can always find the right food.
In such conditions, a person only needs to feed his pets. Many poultry farmers have different answers to the question "how to feed a duckling?" Everyone does different things. Some read various literature, others draw conclusions based on many years of experience. Accordingly, the diet of little chicks is completely different. One experienced poultry breeder answered the question “how to feed hatched ducklings” that in the first few weeks they should be given boiled shredded carrots and steamed
corn grits. In this case, everything needs to be mixed very carefully. As greens, dandelions, nettle and green onions are used. It is very interesting that it is nettle that has a strong influence on the growth of ducklings. The larger it is, the faster they grow. Mature chicks can be fed with vegetables: beets, zucchini,
fodder cabbage. Necessarily raw and mixed with bran.
It is necessary to decide what to feed the duckling in advance, even before it appears with you. If the chicks grow quite quickly, this indicates the proper nutrition and good health of the birds.