Do your campbells fly??

[jaycee]

Hello all. I have Khaki Campbell ducks which are now about 21 weeks old hatched June 1st. A couple now have begun laying, we have collected about a dozen eggs total and today for the 1st time more than one in the same morning. My question is, do your campbell ducks fly? I ask because I read everywhere that campbells are only marginal flyers and will rarely be able to clear a five foot fence. Well that is NOT my experience!

I have a duck pen which is about 25' X 35'. It is surrounded by 4' chain link fence nailed to 6 foot board fence with 2 feet of chicken wire stapled at the top. The fences are solid and 6' tall. I have a couple kiddie pools in there for them and attached is a 12' X 8' barn stall at one end of the pen where I lock them at night.

Well these ducks were never very tame despite my efforts to socialize them, they are very scared of people. And more and more of them started to fly when they would get upset and rattled. On a couple of occasions I had individual ducks take off in the air, clear the fence and reach heights of 40 or 50 feet and one even landed over 300 yards away. Most of the time they circled back though because they don't want t leave their flock. I had nine and one of the girls was flying out of the duck pen and I'd find her in the pasture on the other side of the fence every day for about 2 weeks. Then we had a tragedy, while I was at work and she got out, my rescue dogs killed and ate her Nothing left but a big mess of feathers in the pasture and 2 wings...

So I got my wife to help me clip all the others wings that night. It was so easy to do that I kick myself for not doing it before we lost one. Now of course they don't even attempt to fly and they have even calmed considerably. I would recommend anyone who gets campbells to clip them before they reach maturity. It is very easy, just extend one wing and cut the end 10 or 12 feathers off about halfway up. I would do it before they start flying because once they do its hard to catch them, we had to enclose them in the barn and hang a tarp up at the ends of the pens so we could get them.

I am curious, has anyone else had similar experiences with campbell's or are mine just an extreme case?

 

[CelticOaksFarm]

Yep had one fly over the pasture fence and fret cause she didn't know how to come back. Wings are now clipped.

 

[GrannyCarol]

Mine never got into flying, but they were with a mixed group of larger ducks that really can't fly, so maybe they stayed with their friends? Or maybe mine are awfully fat? hehe My Khaki's can fly a few feet in the air, but never really seem to do so.

 

[newbyduckmom]

Yeah, my Khaki's, the hens in particular, are getting quite good at flying - over 4 ft fence, out of the duck house. Drakes "walk the fence" (fly while walking up it) and go in and out of the fence all the time. They really like to fly out of the duck house......I have six ducks, but more like 10-12 when I try to get the hens in. I put them in and they fly out again.

 

[bogielousa]

My Khakis fly better than my mallards do! Especially the girl! She could probably clear my 6.5 ft fence!! She flew over my head one day and almost escaped! The wings got clipped the next day

 

[grawg]

Do khakis and runners get less airborne as they get older? I was always under the impression that these breeds were too heavy to fly... maybe as the get older they let themselves go a bit, take that extra portion at dinnertime, take few more naps during the day, etc...

 

[zzGypsy]

even my fat rouens and cayougas can occasionally get their feet off the ground... if they run and flap hard into a good breeze!
khaki's and runners are much lighter and can fly well enough to clear a 4-5' fence from time to time.
that doesn't necessarily change as they get older, but might as they get fatter!