6 Reasons Ducks are Better Than Chickens on a Homestead

I own small flocks of both, and a couple of sheep. As I work outside putting up fencing etc., they all follow me around. A few years back, a predator killed my duck flock, leaving one survivor. He moved into the sheep pen, sleeping on their backs for warmth. The next spring, I bought more ducks but my survivor, instead of joining them, hung with the sheep grazing alongside them all summer. Animals are so interesting and good company.

I have ducks, the pool water is the best liquid fertilizer you can use. In drought times especially, I water everything with the 'duck water', and my property is green, green, green ! And yes, they are messy, but like he said, more fun and personality.

I gave my ducks a large kid pool because I Loved watching them swim underwater. But that water would get nasty before the end of the second day, and the ducks themselves would avoid it. Good thing I designed it so the drain plug would drain into a pipe the irrigated the garden. But like I said, it was a larger sized kid pool, meaning a larger amount of water. But being efficient as possible, irritating into the garden meant less watering the garden. I incubated some duck eggs so I could be the first thing they saw when hatching, because I wanted a whole line of duckies to follow me in a row😊. I'm a man, but I was their mommy

A lot of good points, I keep both. A flock of about 80 chickens and 15 ducks. The 15 ducks are more work than all 80+ chickens combined. You need to replace their bedding 1/10th as often if you raise chickens. You need to replace bedding for mold and waste several times a day for ducks. I change it a couple times a month with the chickens. You can easily remove chicken poop from bedding, you cannot do the same for ducks and must replace their entire bed since they soak it in wet and runny poop. Chickens can easily be kept in smaller spaces and need less food, they drink less water and cost less money to keep. Ducks are better if you ignore all of the obvious downsides, for sure. Edit: Also, you can buy and feed about 3-4 chickens for the same price as feeding and buying 1 duck. So, Duck eggs being bigger is meaningless. If I have four chicken eggs and you have 1 duck egg, I have more food.

I agree. Ducks are comical and make my heart smile. And bringing joy into someone's life is a treasure.

I've raised both ducks and chickens (hundreds on a homestead), and chickens are remarkably easier, and more cost effective. Ducks make a huge mess, and need constant clean up. Duck meat is good, but there is less of it. Even the most tender duck is more chewy than the average chicken. Duck eggs are larger, but also taste a bit different and they are a lot thicker. I've never liked a scrambled duck egg. But maybe you do. Duck eggs are superior for certain baked goods, but that's about it. Ducks need more water, and make a huge mess of it. They also make a mess of their food, and they prefer forage that looks an awful lot like our gardens. Chickens will scratch for grubs, ducks will scheme for your veggies. Ducks are a little better against predators, but only if you get something like a Muscovy (claws). Even then, they are only marginally better against a possum or racoon. I saw one large duck fight off a juvenile fox, and watched the fox walk away shocked it got scratched across the face so hard. But again, that was a Muscovy. I liked that duck. I don't raise birds anymore, but would say chickens should be the primary flock, with a few ducks in the mix if you really want them. Geese are just big ducks, with the same (bigger) issues. FWIW, chickens will sit on duck eggs until they hatch, but a broody chicken will sit on a rock if you let her. Ducks generally ignored the chicken eggs. The geese would sit on all three, and liked to break up fights among the "lower" birds. So they have that going for them. Edit: Ducks have more personality and are more likely to engage with you. They are generally friendly and will sit next to you for an hour. Some will let you scratch/pet them. Chickens are dumb as a rock and have the attention span of a three year old kid on meth. There is nothing "cool" about chickens. Ducks definitely have the cool factor down.

Love your shirt. I've reading up on both birds, and I'm finding that I like ducks better (even though I prefer chicken meat over duck). A few notes, if I may... ...Ducks are prized by chefs not only for their meat, but also for their fat for use in frying. ...Duck down can not only help keep the birds warm, it can also be used to keep humans warm if put into quilts, comforters, jackets, etc. ..."Duck water" can be collected and stored in a large tank as grey water for use in the garden. Don't let that stuff go to waste. ...One of the reasons ducks are more resistant to exterior parasites is thanks to that water - they drown the parasites with their swimming. ...One of the reasons ducks are more resistant to internal parasites is due to their higher body temperature, making their bodies "inhospitable" to internal parasites. ...To help promote pastured duck (and chicken) health, you can plant medicinal herbs of the right kinds in the pasture. Just a few thoughts I wanted to share.

I love my ducks. I love my duck eggs. They are messy as all get out, but their cuteness and great personalities makes it worthwhile having to deal with their issues.

9:33 One thing that can help is instead of small baths, utilize keyline design and build pond aquaculture catchments on contour with your local water shed. This will let you coproduce water plants & ducks/fish/freshwater shellfish without over taxing your water budget by capturing ground water. Little duck pools are good temporarily but ponds built into their range lets you do more without the nastyness.

Ducks are messy but honestly it’s so worth it to put in a pond!!! If you don’t have a pond I highly suggest it but keep it close by to your coop we would find eggs all around our pond

In my case ducks are way more work as they seem to eat almost twice as much as my laying hens and are an absolute pain in the butt when it comes to collecting eggs. I mean, ~250 eggs a year is great and all, but it doesn't really mean much when they make me go on an Easter egg hunt every day. Cleaning out their stinky pool every day is also something you would have to consider (this isn't about being lazy, more so water restrictions and/or droughts). Considering the fact that they're so hard to pluck and process, I'm going to have to resort to just selling them to the next unfortunate individual that gets to keep them.

For many years, I did not want to raise ducks. We've always raised chickens. We moved to a new property four years ago and every year we have plague status grasshopper infestation. So my husband and I finally decided to try ducks. Guess what, I absolutely love them! We use the back to Eden style garden so there's no mud to be made with their swimming pools or water buckets. They free range in our veggie gardens and the rest of our yard. They have done an amazing job cutting down the grasshopper population. I don't find them to be that messy. And I prefer water over chicken dust. In the next few years, I plan to fade out of chickens and focus on the ducks. I love that they can be pest control in the garden without destroying it. I couldn't be happier with them!

Ducks don't crow in the morning, disturbing your neighbors.

Good to know that you can plant a garden in a duck run. Straight on w/o being damaged by 'hot' manure. I am planting some vegetable seeds in a weed free duck pen today. Wait and see how it does. Will put a divider if I notice the ducks pulling out the seedlings. Thank You for your video.

Always fun, quirky, and entertaining. Thanks for being you. Becky from Kansas City

Hi! Great video! I'm a chef and I just want to clarify something about duck meat. Duck meat has two classifications: Scientific Classification and Culinary Classification. According to the Scientific Classification duck meat is "poultry" which makes it white meat, because the USDA classifies any livestock that walks on two legs as poultry. So basically any bird is poultry according to the Scientific Classification. However, to us chefs, duck meat is not white. According to Culinary Classification, meat that remains dark when cooked is considered red meat. It can be served rare like beef, venison, or any other red meat. Most birds are this way, and are therefore considered red meat in the kitchen; such as quail, pheasant, pigeon, etc. Turkeys and chickens are really the only "white meat" birds when it comes to cooking, because if you serve either of those rare, you could make someone sick! This being said, I've always thought chicken was healthier than duck, because in my head it's always been red meat, and we all know white meat is healthier than red meat, especially for men over 40 like myself. So I was very surprised at 4:42 when you said that duck meat is healthier than chicken meat! 30 years of cooking and I've been thinking it was the other way around this entire time! I'm glad I watched this video and learned something new today!

Hello im from Philippines, i choose Muscovy duck because in Philippines we have 6 months raining season every year, and duck love when it's raining season amd a wet duck is a happy duck, they also play outside while raining, and duck eggs in Philippines is very popular because of salted egg and balut, and Muscovy duck in Philippines only eat weeds, insect, any kinds of leafy vegetables and Muscovy duck lay there eggs to hatch and pest resistance

Try “Standard Size Old English Game Chickens”. They’re extremely cold hardy, they don’t require a pen and can free range all day without a pen. Mine fly away from predators and chase hawks if a hawk approaches their babies. In addition, they live at least 15 years and they go broody easily. They’re extremely intelligent.

The hardest thing to do is kill weeds for a garden. The absolute best preliminary step to starting a homestead garden is to keep chickens on the dirt for a year. You Want the Chickens to Kill the grass. You Want Destruction. Chickens are great destroyers and great garden tools.

There was so much fun watching this. Humorous and very informative as well.