For the last few years, a friend with a farm near Northfield has had me come down to help him clean out wood duck houses and prepare them for the following Spring. We clean out the old wood shavings, eggs that did not hatch and any mouse nests. At the same time we make any quick repairs that we can handle. In the Fall of 2020, it seemed like we were doing a lot of repairs or found houses that were not worth repairing. I offered to build him new wood duck houses if he could pay for the wood.
It turns out that a local snowmobile club has routed a trail through his land and have been good about making donations in support of his conservation efforts. So he was able to get a grant from the club to cover the material cost.
Preparing for the Build
The current wood duck houses were built with a wide variety of different styles. Some were top loading. some were side opening and others opened in the front. They were built from a variety of materials including Cedar, Pine and who knows what. Some were nailed and a few were screwed together. As we made the rounds we talked about which styles we liked and which ones were a pain to service or required a lot of repairs.
We settled on Cedar, screwed and glued with a front opening.
The Build
A quick trip to our local Menards and I had all of the materials. Working from my cut sheet, I was able to break down all of the boards into the required pieces.
Then, I started assembly. I did one house from start to finish to see if all of the parts were cut correctly. The plans were good although it soon became apparent that due to warping I would have to build them one by one and tweak things as I went. I glued the joints, then used a brad nailer to hold the pieces in place. I followed up with deck screws.
After two days worth of work, I had 11 new wood duck houses finished. We bought lumber for 10 but I was able to squeeze out an extra house with careful planning.
Delivery and Installation
Soon after I finished the Wood Duck Houses, I ran them down to the farm. They were stored until the spring when the ground thawed out.
Mid-spring, I went down with a couple of my pheasant hunting buddies and we installed several of the houses. When we did the Fall cleanup, several had been used and all were good shape.
Update July,2025: I wrote a book entitled “Build a Better Wood Duck House”.
