Quacks & squeaks - Rouen duck sounds

Tomhusker

Songster
10 Years
May 28, 2010
601
67
201
Carson, Iowa
I have a small flock of 10 fifteen week old ducks, 6 of which are Rouens. I read that you can sex them by the vocalizations, quacking for females, squeaky for males. By now the Rouens are pretty well defined by feather color and I can see that I have one male and five females.
They seem to follow the "sexing by sound" rule except for one female who has never uttered a single quack. She squeaks, but sounds nothing like the raspy Drake does.

Is this normal or is something wrong with her?
 
I have a small flock of 10 fifteen week old ducks, 6 of which are Rouens. I read that you can sex them by the vocalizations, quacking for females, squeaky for males. By now the Rouens are pretty well defined by feather color and I can see that I have one male and five females.
They seem to follow the "sexing by sound" rule except for one female who has never uttered a single quack. She squeaks, but sounds nothing like the raspy Drake does.

Is this normal or is something wrong with her?

Does she seem healthy otherwise? I've had both ducks and drakes whose call wasn't quite right, but it hasn't caused them any harm. Our best female, which is also our smallest, doesn't exactly quack. My hubby actually calls her Squeak because of the noise she makes, which is nothing like our other females.

Do you feel pretty sure about the sexing by plumage? Some of our grays and blue fawns that I know to be drakes from vent sexing aren't yet getting their nuptial plumage, so they look very much like the ducks.
 
I'm pretty confident about the sexing. One Drake with a head that is turning a dark black (green sheen when the sun hits it) and five with coloring consistent with photos of other Rouen females. I'll post pics later.

She appears very healthy, free ranging with the rest all day long. No abnormal behaviors. She seems to be perfectly normal, only she don't quack.
 

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