For about 5 months we were living with one of our ducks, Red. Red is a Pekin duck that is quite large. In that case, since Red is so large she puts a lot of pressure on her feet. Red may have stepped on a thorn or a rock and therefore got Bumblefoot which is when a duck or a chicken gets an infection on their foot. Red was limping and had a descent sized gash on her foot. We immediately brought her inside and reached out to our friend Alex from @duckhollowfarm and asked her a million questions. She was great at helping us out with tips, and also selling us her herbal blends that will make Red get better as soon as possible.
We tried leaving her in a dog crate and that only lasted two days max since we felt so guilty leaving her in there. We then realized that she doesn’t necessarily go far so we decided to set up some wee wee pads and even a small dog bed on the floor in front of our bed. Keep in mind at this time Joe and I were living in a 400 square feet cottage. It was actually okay in the nights when Red was technically lose in our cottage, we actually slept the first night totally at peace ( she was not quacking or stomping around). But then the second night.. we slept for probably two hours and she was flailing, she was marching her way in to the kitchen, the bathroom, it was madness. We then decided at nights we would keep her in a dog crate and during the day we would leave her loose. That was okay, we actually had to drape a blanket over her cage at night if we wanted to sleep in past 5am.
But it went well, our home was a barn but that was alright because we just wanted to make sure that Red was getting the best possible care. We got pretty used to it, she took baths in our cottage and was pretty spoiled at times, and we even let Igor (her boyfriend, the male duck) come inside every now and then to say hello.
But then we moved, we only moved right down the road to a larger scale cabin but still, Red was not 100%. But luckily this cabin had a spare bedroom and well I think you can guess who ended up taking that space. We also invested in a duck diaper for her so that when we were home she could hang out with us in the living room. That was probably the best part. Our cat, Dexter would actually run up to her and lick her beak every so often, and it was just so cute how animals want to invite other animals in their home space.
Living with Red was an intense adventure, some days we didn’t feel like cleaning her room out but we had to, other days we were scrambling and did not feel like we were giving her the attention that she needed. But we made up for it in the end, so that was alright.
Finally, after endless baths in our tub, endless diaper changes ( funny thing.. we would clean her diaper and then hang it on our back porch and our landlord would totally see it and think it was Joeys thong or whatever haha, also Joey doesn’t wear a thong). But it was so funny how we were so used to seeing her diaper hung up everywhere, and people would come over and be like ” uh what is that?”. But finally, she was better! We were so worried that the other flock would not be inviting to her since they haven’t really hung out with her in so long but thankfully they were.
We still have to make sure that she takes it easy, and still give her some herbal medicine but she is so much happier and healthier.
If anybody has any questions about how to treat bumble foot we will put what we gave her and how we treated her in a separate blog post, so comment below if anybody ever comes into that issue. Also, a special thank you to @DuckHollowFarm for helping us save Red.