I give water bowls the ducklings can get into from day one. These bowls are only about 1" deep but they do splash about and play in them.
After about a week they get deeper water, deep enough to swim in. These bowls are 6" deep. They have weld mesh tightly fitted around the edges into the water so the ducklings can get a grip to get out. The wire acts as a scrambling ladder. Never lost a duckling in the water yet.

Heating depends on the ambiant temperature and the number of ducklings. In a winter freeze a small number would have heat for at least 2 weeks. In the summer a large number may not have artificial heat at all. All my ducklings have a low roofed well insulated shelter in their run, a form of haybox brooder. The ducklings own shared body heat keeps them warm.

There are as many systems as there are flocks of ducks. Good luck with finding the one that works best for you. There are no rules.

A paint roller tray is a good way for giving little ducklings safe access to paddling water.
I've only reared two ducklings but found that leaving them with access to paddling water all the time made way too much mess.  So mine got supervised swimming in a basin in the bath every evening until they were 4 or 5 weeks old and had access to outside where they had a trug of water to swim in.

Is there any straight forward way to differentiate between the male and female adult Aylesbury?
Having looked on 't'internet at piccies, they look very similar!
Ta!

Hi geezer i thought the same as you i put my ducklings in a large cage deep base thought they will stay nice and clean wrong they used to back into the corners and fire sxxt up my hallway walls and splash water everywhere they are just messy i started putting old towels round the sides of the cage and this helped i still love ducklings even if they do redecorate your hallway not in my colour scheme leanne

mollie wrote on Feb 25^th, 2010 at 7:44am:


OMG do you have pink beaks if you do could i get some hatching eggs off you even though i live in ireland they are so hard to get no one has them over here.
As for sexing older ducks and drakes the drake has a ture in it tale like a kiss curl and the ducks dont its the same with the indian runner ducks plus if there out together look for the one that has a clean back the ones with durt on there backs are more than likely the ducks and the other is a drake