Duckling was born with turned in and curled feet :(

Our school hatched duck and chicken eggs last week and we had one little duck that tried to hatch out for 5 days. We could all see the beak and chest breathing heavily inside and because we were told not to help did nothing. Finally we helped the little one out. After an intense night the duckling is now 3 days old, with lots of energy, eating, sleeping and pooping just fine. The only thing is the feet that are both turned in and curled up. I read a lot about using the shoes method for helping the curled feet and it has been trying to balance and walk around with them on (moving from lunging forward to actual steps). At the same time, whenever the shoes come off, it is also trying to walk around on its turned and curled feet. I'm worried it will develop calluses on it's feet from doing this, but he seems to like being able to do it. It's also working on getting itself upright when it falls over flat on it's stomach. So now I'm not sure of what to do, should I continue with the shoes to uncurl the feet or just let it walk around like that?

This is one tough duckling and I want to do whatever I can to help. Any help is greatly appreciated

Nutrition is a very important part of helping ducklings with leg and foot problems.

I encourage you to post over on the Duck Forum.

Great that you are working with the duckling! They can recover from all kinds of setbacks. We have no guarantees, but I have seen some great success stories.

B vitamins may have been a little low in the yolk, so getting some Brewer's yeast (not baking yeast) into the little one's food (a tablespoon brewer's yeast per cup of food for about 10 weeks is one thing Duck Forum people have recommended). You could also crush a B Complex tablet into the food, but I don't recall the exact dosage per day on that one right now.

Thank you for your suggestions. I will do it right away. Patito is really the sweetest little thing.

My Patito said:

Thank you for your suggestions. I will do it right away. Patito is really the sweetest little thing.

Click to expand...

Patito! Ay, bendito