Pekin Duck Bill Colors (White vs. Yellow)

Aylesbury Ducks....Not Pekin

My duck had a orange bill for about 2 days after her rescue, then it went pale for about 2 weeks then went orange again. Preety sure she is a female. She has never been sick in her life but when I found her she was on her last legs.

I was dealing with this issue this very morning! I reached out to my “Duck Lives Matter ” group to make sure I was treating my Valentine correctly.
She was egg-bound. Members of the group suggested I give her calcium. So I crushed up a calcium supplement and fed it to her in water with some mealworms. After she gobbled it up, her bill went from solid white to this in the picture within minutes. After an hour, her bill was completely black again and she’d laid her egg.
It was such a relief!

We have two Pekins. Bother were raised exactly the same way - same diet, indoors until feathered out, no illness. One has the lighter beak and the other the orange beak. Is it possible that it is an indication that one is male and the other female?

Feedingfour said:

I have two Pekins that have been raised together since birth. One has a bright orange bill and one is pasty pink. The both free range, both get the same food, etc. I was googling why and it brought me here. Glad to hear my ducks aren't the only ones with different color beaks

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Mine are the EXACT same situation and I found this feed the same way as you! The one with the pink bill was brighter yellow as a duckling and has always had a lighter pinkish bill the other was light yellow with an orange bill and now they both look exactly the same except their bill colors which have not changed since they were babies and same situation.. whatever one eats the other does as well. They’ve always been kept together and fed the same thing. Glad to hear (as you said too) that I’m not the only one!
Also they haven’t started laying yet (they’re about a week away from 6 months) but I’m 99.9% sure they’re both female due to their quacks and lack of tail curls! Unfortunately I bought 2 Cayuga ducks a couple days after I bought the pekins and both have raspy quacks and tail curls so I’m 99.9% sure they’re both drakes which is unfortunate for egg purposes obviously but they’re GORGEOUS ducks and all 4 love each other!
They also live with 6 hens and a rooster (4 Easter eggers, a barred rock (I think) a beautiful tiny silkie hen and a beautiful silkie rooster. I knew my roo was gonna be a roo from the second I bought him, I could just tell and I was pretty sure my silkie hen was female when I bought her as well, also these are my first flock so I really didn’t KNOW but I had a strong feeling just by the way they looked and acted as babies ) My son bought 4 chicks from tractor supply and one ended up being a silkie and I then bought 2 from kahoots a few days later and the ones from kahoots are GORGEOUS while the one from tractor supply was definitely NOT and also extremely aggressive so we had to rehome him. Also 3 of the 4 chicks he got at tractor supply ended up being Roos and all aggressive AF and had to be rehomed. I got my EEs from cackle hatchery and they’re BEAUTIFUL as well! I love tractor supply in general but won’t be buying birds from them in the future! Not sure which hatchery they use but the chicks were marketed as female and the silkie we got there was not supposed to be there.. he was in with all the barred rocks and we didn’t even realize what he was until we got them home. I fully understand that vent sexing isn’t always right on and it’s normal to get a male sometimes but 3 out of 4?!? If they were marketed as straight run then fine but they weren’t. Idk maybe we got the only 3 males in the whole bunch!

brodysam said:

We have four pekin ducklings. They are from the same hatch, but were separated at 12 days old for about 4 weeks. They are now back together. My concern is, the two that were separated off have very faded, white bills. The other two have vibrant, healthy looking yellow bills. I don't know of any change from their routine when they weren't with me as far as type of food. Can anyone tell me why they're bills would be a different color? They appear normal and healthy otherwise.

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I had a drake that from day 1 had a pale beak, almost pink in color. He was fine.