Ducks make fine feathered friends

My son’s class hatched duck eggs in school and we were given two ducklings. We built a raccoon-proof pen in the backyard with a kiddie pool for them to swim in. These birds are friendly and we enjoy them. What advice can you give us about caring for them?

Ducks are easy to keep with a diet of prepared duck pellets and lots of green vegetables to eat. The biggest problem is keeping them in the winter when the hoses are shut off and the kiddie pool freezes. What I do for mine in the cold weather is to get a large washtub that I can fill with two 5-gallon buckets, and twice a day I fill the washtub for them and allow them to drink and splash about. The tub is small enough so that I can just turn it upside down and dump out the resulting ice and dirty water and then refill it. Then, in the spring, we resume the larger pool for them. I like to keep ducks as pets; they are friendly and even-tempered.

Four pairs of heron have built nests in some large trees in the front of our house. The mess on our front lawn is unbelievable. Poop and feathers are everywhere and all over our cars if we park them in the driveway. Is there any way we can discourage the birds from living here? Nothing scares them at all.

Herons need big trees with strong branches to hold their bulky nests built of sticks. Their babies will be gone in a couple of weeks, so after they leave the nest and fly off to live in the marshes, have a tree surgeon come to look at the branches and cut them off. Hopefully when the birds come back next spring, they will go looking elsewhere for a new home.