Feeding Basics

 |  2 min read

What should you feed your ducks? This is an important decision and a highly debatable topic where there are many options. First, here is an overview of the main types of food for ducks.

Commercial Feed

Commercial feed is a perfectly computed mix of grains, meat products, chemicals, minerals, and vitamins. There are various mixes such as layer feed, chick starter, and grower feed. In some areas, you can even find specialized waterfowl feed or “all-flock” feed meant for a mixed flock of various species and ages. Ducks need more niacin in their diet than chickens, so if you feed your ducks chicken feed, you may have to add extra niacin.

In most cases, commercial feed should comprise the majority of your ducks’ diet.

Grains

Grains alone don’t have all the nutrition ducks need. However, they can still be a good addition to your ducks’ diet in limited amounts. Grain choices include corn, wheat, oats, sorghum, barley, spelt, rye, triticale, buckwheat, amaranth, and more.

Vegetables and Fruits

If you have a garden, this can be an excellent supplement to your ducks’ diet. Do you have some wilted cabbage or lettuce? Overripe tomatoes or bananas? Cucumber peels? Watermelon rinds? Give them to your ducks! (Just don’t feed them anything moldy or rotten.) You can even give them access to your compost pile. Also, some leftovers are okay to feed your flock, such as salad or rice and veggies.

Meat

Ducks are omnivores. They need some meat! While foraging freely, ducks will gobble up slugs, worms, snails, even lizards and small frogs. I’ve heard of one Muscovy that ate gopher babies. Many duck and chicken owners will raise or buy mealworms and feed them to their flock. Some owners also raise earthworms for their flock.

Forage

The easiest and cheapest food of all: just let your ducks forage! They will scout through the grass for bugs, worms, grass seeds, leaves, and anything else they can find that’s edible. They just need a large area, preferably with a diverse array of plants and weeds. To maximize your ducks’ foraging potential, make several pens and rotate your flock from one area to another.

Read more:

How to Feed Ducks

15 Ways to Reduce Duck Feed Costs

What Ducks Can and Can't Eat
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8 comments

Can you over feed mealworms to your ducklings?

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Yes, I'm sure you can. Worms can't comprise a duck's entire diet, so if they fill themselves with worms, there will probably be a nutritional imbalance. They could also become obese from overeating.

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Can you start ducklings on a natural diet?

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If you mean a diet not containing any commercial rations, yes, theoretically, you should be able to. All animals have natural diets in the wild and that's what they're supposed to have. However, I don't know of any flock owner who starts ducklings on a completely natural diet. My eventual goal is to grow ALL the food my ducks need, but I haven't succeeded yet, so I can't tell you exactly how to do it.

Protein content is one of the main concerns. You can't raise ducklings on lettuce and cucumbers. It needs to be varied, and it needs to contain plenty of protein -- at least 17% of a duckling's diet should be protein.

If you want to try to raise ducks on a completely natural diet, do all the research you can. And remember that their diet in the wild is a good model.

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good day,
i want to raise ducks, i need some of the details how. . .
thanks and more power
bernard avellana mandawe

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I usually feed ducks unsalted peanuts or oyster crackers at a nearby creek. How much of each should I feed them, or how much per duck?

Thanks,
Chris

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Hi Chris,

Not much. Ducks eat around 6-8 ounces a day, so if you feed them too much of one type of food, it could cause a dietary imbalance. It should be all right for up to 10% of their diet to be treats and suchlike, which would mean less than an ounce per day. The more you vary what you give them, the safer it is to give them larger amounts. Some other healthy options ducks love include birdseed, tomatoes, cucumbers, lettuce, cabbage, and peas. Bread isn't a good option since it's mostly just empty calories.

Hannah

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Thank you Hannah. I'll start feeding them the healthier variety that you recommended.

Thanks,
Chris

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