How to herd your ducks (aka get your ducks in a row!)

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Lots of new pet and backyard duck parents have trouble getting their ducks to go where they (the humans) want them to. The answer to this puzzle is quite simple: a stick. No, you don’t use a stick to smack your ducks, you use it to herd them.

We can tell you from years of experience that without a herding stick in hand, your ducks are nearly impossible to get in a row. We’re not sure whether ducks’ responsiveness to herding sticks was bred into them over thousands of generations of domestication or simply some glitchy adaptive, epigenetic response associated with fear of airborne predators.

Regardless, when you’re in your yard herding ducks, think of yourself as a maestro or maestra and your ducks as a mobile orchestra. Granted, the cacophony of quacks you’ll elicit from your ducks would make Beethoven shriek in horror.

Proof that you can sometimes get your ducks in a row.

How to herd your ducks

Our ducks foraging one of our front yard beds. As you can see, they like to stick pretty close together.

7 duck herding stick tips:

1. Use a stick that’s about 3-4′ long to herd ducks. Nope, you don’t have to buy a herding stick, any ol’ stick of the right length will do. Our personal favorite materials are bamboo and elderberry because they’re straight and light weight.

2. Keep a few duck herding sticks around in places where you’ll need them. For instance, we have certain spots throughout our front and back yard where there’s always a few duck sticks on the ready if/when we need them.

3. If you have a larger flock (20+ birds) or a small free-range farming operation, you may want to attach a small flag to the end of your duck herding stick to make it more visible to birds in the front of the formation.

A magic wand that makes ducks do what you want? When you have a herding stick, you'll be amazed at how much easier it is to make your ducks go where you want them. How to herd your ducks, by Tyrant Farms. — A magic wand that makes your ducks do what you want? When you have a herding stick in hand, you’ll be amazed at how much easier it is to make your ducks go where you want them.

4. Want your ducks to go to the right? Place your stick to the left of them or tap it on the ground to the left of them.

5. Want your ducks to go left? Place your stick to the right of them or tap it on the ground to the right of them.

how to herd ducks - herding stick — Go left, ducks! Place your herding stick to the right.

6. Want your ducks to go straight ahead? Either: a) hold the stick straight up in the air, or b) move the stick back and forth right-left-right-left while walking forward.

7. If you want your ducks to slow down or stop, simply put the herding stick behind your back and also stop moving forward yourself.

Duck herding video:

Here’s a quick 30 second video showing duck herding in action so you can see what it’s like behind the stick:

(*The video may not display if you have ad blocking software on your computer, sorry!)

Can you train ducks to respond to sounds?

Yes, your ducks can be trained to respond to specific sounds and even come to your calls. For example, we have a loud, drawn out duuuuck-a-liiing call that we’ve trained our ducks to associate with receiving treats. When they hear that call, they come waddle-running over to us, quacking excitedly the whole way.

Our ducks also respond to specific tapping sounds of a herding stick. For instance, a loud “tap, tap” against a tree trunk or tomato cage means they need to come out of a certain bed they’re foraging in.

Multiple loud tap, tap, taps of a herding stick as dusk approaches means it’s time to head back to the backyard in preparation for going into their coop at night.

We also know of small farmers who use a whistle to get their ducks to come out of their fields and back to the coop in the evening without having to herd them. To train the ducks, they provide food in the coop (not in the fields where the ducks forage), and eventually got their ducks to associate the sound of the whistle with being fed in their coop.

So now you know how to herd your ducks and how you can potentially train them to respond to certain sounds or calls to make your job as Chief Duck Herder even easier.

Thank us next time you put your ducks into their coop at night or need to shew them away from one of your garden beds.

Quack on,