I've meant to post weekly photos of the ducklings to show how fast they grow. I've taken pics, but got behind on posting, so here's a catch up. You may also be pleased to know that the wee duckling who was all twisted up due to a thiamine deficiency fully recovered within a few days and is now indistinguishable from his yellow siblings.

We have two batches of ducklings currently.

The first batch of ducklings hatched on Jan 22nd. For photos of them at 1 week and 2 weeks old, click HERE. Now here they are over the subsequent weeks so far:

As for the second batch of ducklings, here are their photos week by week:

Even though I've watched it happen before, it still blows me away how fast domestic ducklings grow! More photos over the next few weeks.

The hard part will be when it is time to decide which ones to keep! Especially as I won't be able to sex them at that point - it takes time for the curly tail feather on the drakes to show up, and I don't want to keep feeding too many for all that time.

One of my recently hatched ducklings looked peculiar. It kept turning it's head completely upside under it's body (so it looked headless from above) and walking backwards. Initially it was turning it's head to the side as it if was having trouble seeing, and putting it's head on its siblings as if feeling its way - I wondered if it might be blind. But as the symptoms worsened, I realised I was looking at a severe thiamine deficiency.

The first time I ever saw thiamine deficiency in animals was a few years ago. I went out one morning to check on our sheep and their new lambs. I noticed one 2-3 week old lamb lying curled up by herself, much further away from her mother and twin than is normal. After some observation, I gently moved closer, to encourage the lamb to stand and move, so I could see what, if anything was the problem. The lamb staggered to her feet, but was completely uncoordinated - it looked like she couldn't figure out how to get all four legs moving the right way at once. She finally made it over to her mother, and attempted to feed, but was unable to latch on, and then collapsed and curled up again. Hmmmm.......this didn't look like any of the other sheep disorders I was familiar with........after some contemplation, thiamine deficiency was determined as the likely cause. I obtained and administered a thiamine injection from the vet. It was like a miracle cure! An hour or so later, this wee lamb was happily bouncing around the paddock with the others, and feeding fine!

Not long after that, I started to pay attention to the Facebook posts of an American chap who had been sharing that he was having problems with his goat kids - a couple had died, and several others were very ill. He believed that severe parasite infections were the cause, and had treated them all for that. He was showing pics of one wee goat that as at death's door - he was worried it wouldn't make it through the night. Unable to stand or feed, it was very ill indeed. After looking more closely at info he had posted over the previous couple of days, I told him that I believed it was not parasites that were the problem, but severe thiamine deficiency, known as Goat Polio when it strikes goats. It is often induced by grain feeding; he was feeding his milking goats grain, and their kids were helping themselves too. I recommended he get and administer thiamine injections for all his kids, and withdraw all grain. He did so, and excitedly posted a couple of hours later about the miracle results - the very close to dead kid was now feeding and leaping about, and the others were all recovered too.

Thiamine deficiency results in neurological deficits, which show up as lack of coordination, staggering, strange flexion of the neck (star gazing), inability to feed normally, and finally death.

So, back to my wee duckling. He (I don't know yet if it's a he, but for convenience will refer to it as that) was hatched on Thursday morning. Friday I didn't notice anything strange. Saturday morning I observed the apparent blindness behaviour, but was away most of the day; by the time I got home I'd thought about it and suspected thiamine. That evening the duckling was twisting its neck so that its head was completely upside down and underneath it, and was walking backwards. Well, "walking" wasn't quite accurate - "scooting" is more like it. It would get stuck in odd places and cheep pathetically. Being the weekend, there was no vet available at reasonable cost. I thought about what I had on hand that would have good amounts of B vitamins in it. I added nutritional yeast to the ducklings crumbles.

The following morning (yesterday), it was looking just as bad. I picked him up and brought it inside, and started checking what else I had in the cupboards. A child's liquid vitamin would have been handy, but I didn't have any. Ditto thiamine injections. Finally I picked up my Spirulina powder, which we add to smoothie sometimes. Good amounts of niacin, thiamine, and other B vits. So I dissolved some in water, and spent some time slowly droppering the solution onto the little guy's upside down beak - he swallowed quite a bit little by little. After a while I concluded the stress of being held and away from mama probably was making him worse, so I returned him to the pen. I added more yeast to the feed, and put spirulina in the duckling's water bowls, also leaving them one bowl of plain water.

By Sunday night, he at least had his head on top of his body, rather than underneath!

This morning, he is slightly tipping his head on an angle, and is not quite as steady as his siblings, but is way, way better than yesterday! He's walking forwards, keeping up with his siblings, and grooming himself. Today, I'm putting more yeast in the feed, and more spirulina in some of the water. I'm expecting a full recovery. :-)

In the case of newly hatched poultry, it is not likely a condition induced by their feed, or influenced by the parent's diet, but rather just one of those things who's cause is not well understood. It just seems to happen sometimes to one out of a batch. Prompt treatment will save the little one. No treatment means certain, unpleasant death.

One of my ducks has been sitting on a nest under a tree on the neighbour's side of the fence. EVERY morning she would walk past my bedroom window at 6am, quacking loudly that she wanted her breakfast. As she could only leave the nest for a short period, this meant I had to roll out of bed (if I wasn't up already) and go give her food. When she didn't wake me this morning, I knew that probably meant her ducklings were hatching. Sure enough....7 more wee babies. We moved mama and babies to the cage in the cat-proof run where the last lot started off but have now outgrown.

The newly hatched 12 little ducklings I posted about last time are now 2 weeks old. It's hard to believe how fast they grow unless you see it for yourself. Here's a photo of them at 1 week of age:

And yesterday, at two weeks old:

For the first week, they had shallow bowls of water to drink from (and inevitably sit in). At a week old, I introduced a child's plastic paddling pool for them to swim in, with bricks stacked so they can get out, and a non-slip ramp to get in, as they are not yet big enough to get over the side. They took to it like, well, ducks to water. :-) I haven't got a good pic of them swimming yet though - as soon as I go near, mama duck issues the alarm call and they all abandon the pool and run to her. I did manage to quickly snap this one through the mesh. Ducklings being raised without a mother should not be allowed to swim, as they don't have the oils that make them waterproof until they are feathered, and they are prone to becoming chilled and hypothermic. But since these guys have a mama, they gain oils from her feathers when they cuddle under her.

Yesterday, at two weeks old, I briefly let them out into the bigger run where they met the other ducks. It's not protected from cats though, so I won't leave them out there unattended until they're a little bit bigger.

Ducks love their greens, and these babies are no exception! Today I gave them a bunch of silverbeet from the garden, and they fell upon it with gusto, even though they'd just had their breakfast.

I have another duck sitting on 8 eggs in the neighbour's hedge, due to hatch any day. So, undoubtedly, there will be more duckling photos here in the critter blog soon!

One of our ducks (a White Campbell) has been diligently sitting on a nest of eggs, and Friday morning they began to hatch. Unfortunately she was not in a location safe from cats, and I was about to leave for the airport, so I had to quickly move her and ducklings/eggs to a cage in a cat-proof chicken run. Normally I'd have kept a close eye on her, let them finish hatching, and then move them to a pre-warmed nest, but this time I had to just do it and hope for the best. I moved mama with 3 ducklings, and 9 eggs in various stages of possibly hatching....... A few hours later I was able to check on her. One egg, partly hatched, had rolled out of the nesting box and into the cage itself. I picked it up - completely cold. Figured it was a goner, but a careful peek through the hole in the shell showed the duckling still moving, so I put it back under her.

By the end of the day, we had 12 little ducklings - 6 yellow (which will be white when feathered) and 6 in various combinations if black/brown/yellow. It will be fun to see what colour their feathers are!

Ducklings grow incredibly fast, and are sooooo much hardier than chickens! Last year I had chicks and ducklings hatch on the same day - by 8-10 weeks the ducklings were almost adult size, while the chicks were still very small. If I'd treated close-to-hatching chicks like I did the ducklings above, I could have expected multiple losses, and while I've had many, many clutches of chickens hatch, even in the best circumstances it is almost never a 100% hatch rate!

During the brooding time, chickens will get off the nest for about 15 mins once a day or so, have something to eat, poop, drink, maybe dust bathe, and then dash back to the next before the eggs get cold. Ducks get off once a day too, but they take much longer, have a bath etc, and often their eggs seem completely cold before they get back, though it's probably usually only 20-30 mins. Yet, they survive fine.

I let the duck and ducklings into the bigger run this morning. They're so adorable chasing flies, testing out grass and weeds for edibles, and sunbathing in a big pile.

The ducklings are fed meat bird crumbles for now, plus plenty of fresh water (I have to refill their containers about 4 times a day at the moment!), and fresh greens every day. They LOVE greens! Ducklings should not be fed chick starter crumbles as they are medicated, which are not good for (or needed for) ducklings. The only down side of the meat bird crumbles is that it makes their poop rather smelly, as when they are older I switch them to Happy Hen, a mix of grains.

More duckling photos here in the Critter Blog in days and weeks to come!