Ideas for a muddy duck pen

[bsshog40]

First off, I put a good layer of bark in chicken coop. I left it out from under the coop cause they like bathe there. Now my duck pen is 6 1/2' x 9'. Their house sits outside the pen so they can have the entire pen space. They keep this area pretty muddy and of course, all the rain we've been getting doesn't help. I'm thinking of putting bark in half the pen, opposite the pool side, to try to keep a dry area for them. Think that would help?
On a side note, I thinking of investing in another pen with an access door, and dedicate it to just their pool area. Thay way their main pen can stay dry. This is gonna cost me a little more than what I want to do right now, so I'm just looking for suggestions. I've attached a pic of what I did for my chicken coop. I've also attached a pic of what my duck pen looks like as of present. Thanks, Bobby

 

[bsshog40]

Bump

 

[21hens-incharge]

If that's colored mulch it's not the best choice for chickens or ducks.
It's better to use undyed natural wood mulch. Aged rimial wood chips are recommended. Calling around to tree trimmers in your area asking what they do with the chipped branches may be a way to find a load.

For the ducks I am not sure what to do there except separate the pool area from the main day pen. For around their drinking water maybe pavers set on pea gravel to help with drainage.

When I had ducks I used a stock tank set into a ducky deck with a drain pipe hooked up so I could send the icky water far away. It worked well to help keep things dryer.

I have a few pictures....In hindsight I should have had that valve farther away from the tank as they seemed to enjoy pooping on the trap door access. Not the best picture of the completed pool but it's all I have since I sold the ducks, pool and all. You can see the ramp. The traction tape was a hard fail as they pulled it up in just a few days. There were a few times they dropped rocks in the pool that blocked the ball valve. By not gluing the pipes in place I could take them apart and use high pressure spray to dislodge them.

This first picture is showing the valve. That got hooked to drain pipes to move the water away from the run and structure.

 

[bsshog40]

I had thought about the deck idea also. I think I'm leaning more to trying to make an extension of their pen to have a separate pool area. Probably best in the long run. I've had the red mulch in the chicken pen for a couple weeks now with no problems. I'll start looking for undyed stuff from now on. We're pretty rural out here and not a whole lot of options for decent mulch except for home depot and lowes. Lol
thanks for the response!

 

[StinkyAcres]

They could definitely use more space. My ducks only really make a mess around their pool. The rest of their large pen stays green.

A duck pool deck can also be made for a kiddie pool like you have. I built mine out of a pallet and installed a kitchen sink drain in the pool which can be connected to a pipe or hose.

 

[CoriM]

What I have done which works for me and I see you have lots of grass so could do something similar, is built a moveable tractor that I move around the grass so they always have a fresh clean area. It's not completely predator proof, so I only have them in there when I'm around to supervise. Their main run with the covered roof is half covered in pea gravel around a little pond, and the other half is pine shavings. All of this stays pretty dry and isn't a muddy mess. The picture from inside their run was my first attempt, where I used straw and that did not work around the pond.

 

[BrittKay]

They could definitely use more space. My ducks only really make a mess around their pool. The rest of their large pen stays green.

A duck pool deck can also be made for a kiddie pool like you have. I built mine out of a pallet and installed a kitchen sink drain in the pool which can be connected to a pipe or hose.

This is genius! I personally do not need this, but I'm going to pass it along to others!

 

[BrittKay]

First off, I put a good layer of bark in chicken coop. I left it out from under the coop cause they like bathe there. Now my duck pen is 6 1/2' x 9'. Their house sits outside the pen so they can have the entire pen space. They keep this area pretty muddy and of course, all the rain we've been getting doesn't help. I'm thinking of putting bark in half the pen, opposite the pool side, to try to keep a dry area for them. Think that would help?
On a side note, I thinking of investing in another pen with an access door, and dedicate it to just their pool area. Thay way their main pen can stay dry. This is gonna cost me a little more than what I want to do right now, so I'm just looking for suggestions. I've attached a pic of what I did for my chicken coop. I've also attached a pic of what my duck pen looks like as of present. Thanks, Bobby
View attachment 3847313
View attachment 3847314

I would put gravel in half of your pen (on top of the mulch you already have in that half. Or if you add onto your pen just for pool/water purposes I would definitely put gravel/rock there. As long as it's shaded in the summer it won't get hot and your ducks will be totally fine. I have rock around my water source and it works great.

 

[CoriM]

If you put in gravel use pea gravel since it's got rounded edges.

 

[bsshog40]

I haven't been able to do anything different yet. The mulch really helps for the time being. The ducks get housed up about the same time as the chickens, around 8:45pm. I clean their pool and water tub, and hose down any duck poo on the mulch. With 70 something temps at night, eveything is nice and clean to begin the day. Lol