A view of Mama Hen and her adopted Ducklings 1912
Photo was taken in Germany over a century ago.
Yes, a chicken can raise a duck. This is not an uncommon occurrence on farms.
An adult hen is similar in size to female duck, keeping the eggs warm works out fine.
Baby ducks will quickly imprint on who is raising them so the baby ducks treat the chicken as their mother and will tend to follow her and stay close. The hen has very strong mothering instincts and will stay close to her adopted chicks, keeping an eye out for predators and trying to show them some basics about scratching around for food.
The biggest obstacle is that the ducklings have an instinct to swim in the water and chickens do not, so the chicken will try to stay close at the edge of a pond keeping look out while the duckling will swim close to momma.
Bedding down for the night might be a challenge as well if the ducklings don’t follow mom into the hen house.
A view of Mama Hen and her adopted Ducklings 1912
Photo was taken in Germany over a century ago.
Yes, a chicken can raise a duck. This is not an uncommon occurrence on farms.
An adult hen is similar in size to female duck, keeping the eggs warm works out fine.
Baby ducks will quickly imprint on who is raising them so the baby ducks treat the chicken as their mother and will tend to follow her and stay close. The hen has very strong mothering instincts and will stay close to her adopted chicks, keeping an eye out for predators and trying to show them some basics about scratching around for food.
The biggest obstacle is that the ducklings have an instinct to swim in the water and chickens do not, so the chicken will try to stay close at the edge of a pond keeping look out while the duckling will swim close to momma.
Bedding down for the night might be a challenge as well if the ducklings don’t follow mom into the hen house.