Wood Duck boxes

Anybody else like to put these out?

We’ve got a number of ponds at Dad’s and get more Wood Ducks and Mergansers than anything. A couple years ago the kids and I built and hung out 10 houses. This year we made 6 more. Boys and I went out today and hung the new ones and serviced up the older 10. Next year I may think about putting metal poles out and re-hanging all of them. Way to many raccoons at our place.

Attachments:

1. 

   IMG_20240401_153308543_HDR-1-scaled.jpg
   

2. 

   IMG_20240401_151728995_HDR-scaled.jpg
   

3. 

   IMG_20240401_172731840_HDR-scaled.jpg
   

4. 

   IMG_20240401_153308543_HDR-scaled.jpg
   

5. 

   IMG_20240401_152113942_HDR-scaled.jpg
   

6. 

   329883.jpeg
   

Good job. We have a couple at our place. I’ve had merganser nest and got surprised by squirrels last year.

Just saw some woodies show up today, so we’ll see

lookin good PoP!!!

What do you put inside them for nesting material? I’ve put cedar chips in mine the past few years and get interested pairs but they never stay around and lay eggs… i’m thinking they dont like the cedar chips?

Looks like an awesome day with the kiddos! Start em young with conservation and stewardship. Nice work, dad.

Got a couple to put out at my farm pond.

Attachments:

1. 

   20231017_092620-scaled.jpg
   

That’s kick ass

JoeMX1825 wrote:

What do you put inside them for nesting material? I’ve put cedar chips in mine the past few years and get interested pairs but they never stay around and lay eggs… i’m thinking they dont like the cedar chips?

This year I put pine wood shavings and chips in. I had Cedar in the last couple years. Most the boxes had been used by ducks. 3 had squirrel nests. So, not sure if the type of bedding matters or not, but we’ll see.

Mike W wrote:

Got a couple to put out at my farm pond.

That is an awesome looking farm pond!

I have 3 in my back yard for the last 12 years used by wood ducks and hooded mergansers (and screech owls).
We are a couple hundred yards from a stream.
They are on 4×4 posts. I use a 4 foot length of 5″ stove pipe nailed just below the house to deter predators and trim any branches 10 feet away to prevent squirrels from jumping.
I also put the door on the side to aid in cleaning and filling.
The latest version has a split (mitered overlap) to facilitate filling.
Previous version, I clamped a piece of cardboard to the opening, filled them,
closed the door as far as possible and then slipped the cardboard out while closing the door the rest of the way.
I normally take a block plane to a piece of pine to make shavings.

My first couple batches I made the mitered split door on the side. I think raccoons actually figured out how to use the hook n eye closures. They were always unlatched. This time I wanted to try a top door. I used a door hinge and then used the middle screw hole for my mounting screw. So far, I really like the change. We’ll see how difficult it is to clean out next year.

I have 2 boxes and was thinking of putting one out since I cleared a bunch of trees by the creek that goes through the back of my lot. The creek runs from a spring fed pond 2 yards away. My concern is in that pond there are always a pair of mallards nesting and last year geese showed up but I don’t know if they nested. Anybody have an idea if the wood ducklings would survive with that competition?

Probably have better odds cause the nesting geese would chase away some predators.

I use 2 6 foot sections of 4X4 to put lights on the pond in the winter for the hockey rink. This year I left the one section in the water and attached a house. now I get year round use out of it. Hen woodduck already has been in there several times. They were confused by the ice the other morning.

Attachments:

1. 

   20240328_075853-scaled.jpg