Poor muscovy duck mothers (have yet to see a "good" muscovy mother) who get scared off the nest leaving hatched ducklings (as well as eggs) to be eaten by snakes. Chicken eggs eaten more by dogs, maybe rats, skunks (who help keep the rat population down supposedly and also are endangered - it's a native mesoamerican species, very cute and quite tame as skunks go, don't smell as bad, likes to hide in my bookcase but easily killed by young dogs who don't know better and then stink for quite awhile). Re: snakes, keeping grass down helps, but of course a duck will prefer making her nest in tall grass. Marigolds planted around the coops is supposed to keep them away, and with my climate in south-central Mexico, I can grow them year-round.I've decided on a pastured paddock system but with one chicken coop for
sleeping and laying for better predator protection (snakes are a bigger
problem than ferrets) and more convenient egg collection.
What sorts of problems have you had with snakes?
I made a small link to some stuff about predators. I'm currentlyThanks for the heads up on the predators, I'll look for that, but was referring to the option of a permanent coop, with a series of paddocks around it or attached by a run. The chickens are let out and rotated through the different paddocks, but the coop (for laying and sleeping) stays in one place.
fleshing the article out a bit more.
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