Our Floating Duck House

Hey all, we just finished our floating duck house. Let me know what you think and if you have any questions in order to build your own.

I love it! We had talked about a floating duck house too!

Would you be upset if I copied you??!

I love your floating duck house! Very nice! I see you have an attached rope to pull it to shore (assuming that you collect eggs?) Do you have an easy way to remove the roof for collecting eggs and cleaning? Looks like it is providing great entertainment for the cat. LOL

Dan, did you take any photos during the build? I think it would be awesome to have more details on how you built this bad boy.

Chadwick Holmes wrote:I love it! We had talked about a floating duck house too!

Would you be upset if I copied you??!

Wouldn't be upset at all. I basically did a google image search and found a bunch of ideas to copy off of myself. Then I just used as much spare materials as possible.

Sherri Lynn wrote:I love your floating duck house! Very nice! I see you have an attached rope to pull it to shore (assuming that you collect eggs?) Do you have an easy way to remove the roof for collecting eggs and cleaning? Looks like it is providing great entertainment for the cat. LOL

Thanks!

Yeah, we hope to collect eggs once the ducks grow accustomed. The roof is actually hinged on one end so it just lifts right up. After making the larger octagonal base, we made three smaller octagonal frames all the same size; one for the base of the house, one for the top of the house, and one for the roof. Then we framed it all together and attached the roof on one end via door hinges. I have some more pics I'll upload when I get a chance.

Bill Erickson wrote:Dan, did you take any photos during the build? I think it would be awesome to have more details on how you built this bad boy.

I did, not as many as I would have liked, but enough to give a good idea of the structure. I'll post them once I upload 'em.

Genius idea! My husband and I want to begin keeping ducks in the spring since we have a very large earthen pond but we weren't sure how we could keep them safe from the coyotes. A floating duck house might work!

Hey Dan,

How's the duck house going? Is it everything you dreamed of?

Looks fantastic. The cat is a nice touch!

My experiences with ducks have led me to want easy to wash out housing for them; this seems pretty ideal, just hose it down and the ducky water goes right back into the pond, at which point you can water stuff with your lovely enriched pond water.

Do you have swimming predators like mink to worry about? They are probably the number one threat to small livestock in my area, and they'd consider that house a buffet unless it is locked up at night!

The fun part is getting the ducks to use it. I built a floating duck house a few years back and the ducks totally ignored it. It was only used by a cormorant that would occasionally use its roof as a perch and pond turtles would use it for sun basking.

Just a quick update.  The ducks do indeed use the house.  During brooding season one of our females used it quite a bit.  This time of year I think they may use it some at night but otherwise not too much during the day.  We have a German Shepherd that's our night watch dog, but still lost two ducks last year to injuries sustained during a night attack.  We think the ducks that were killed were done so by a bard owl since their injuries were gashes below their necks and we had been hearing Bards in the area.  So I think the duck house would have helped them if it was in fact an owl.  Anyway, it's still afloat and seems to be working pretty well.  

A friend of mine built a floating duck house not unlike yours. Unfortunately the ducks were terrified of the pond, probably because a snapping turtle lived nearby. So he brought the house back on shore and it's been sitting on the ground ever since. The other disadvantage to the floating duck house was the difficulty of gathering eggs and cleaning it out. But glad to hear it works for you.