Lame Pekin duck followed me home?

HotLips

Chirping
Feb 21, 2023
47
101
76
I tried posting this earlier but can't find it now. Wondering if I posted it in the wrong place? Anyway, appologies if you've already seen this.

I brought home a lame duck this past weekend and thought I'd see if you have any tips.
We don't know much about her. I'm told she is under a year old and has not started laying eggs yet. However she did sit on a clutch and hatched out some babies.
I see no inflamation, injury to her feet & legs other than her right foot has a single puncture in the webbing that looks like it healed well. Her left foot is rather drawn up a bit and does not fan out all the way like it should. She does stand occasionally but really struggles to walk. It's more of a drag than a walk. About the only other thing we've seen is her lower chest and underside is all scabbed over from dragging herself around. She really doesn't go far in a day but manages to get where she needs to go. Attempted walking is with wings out to help balance.
She is also molting like crazy. I'm thinking this lameness may be caused from a B3 deficience...as that can easily happen in ducks. Given she's less than a year, not laying yet and molting I'm thinking she may be young enough to be able to respond to vitamin therapy. She's getting Brewers yeast in her food along with meal worms. I'm trying to get other B vits and a basic flock vitamine in her too...if one of the other girls don't get it first.
My other 3 ducks have been good with her, nobody picking on her. I start her out in the morning in the pool with peas. I had to get another duck in the pool to teach her that peas are for eating. She does good in the pool. A little awkward but not bad. The drawn up foot sometimes comes up out of the water when paddling. I think the awkwardness is more of an adjusting to water vs being on land. She spent more time in the pool with the other ducks this morning. I think she's starting to relax more and feel at home. I feel like in some ways she's learning to be a duck too. I'm trying to make sure she has plenty of soft bedding (straw) so she's not dragging on anything rough so she can heal.

I normally don't do this sort of thing. We took a couple drakes to an auction and had no plan of coming home with anything unless it was straw. We saw some birds we could be interested in but it was like she was talking to me...it was her eyes. So I brought her home and this is what we got. I think she's in the right place, it was meant to be.
With what you know about birds...any thoughts or advise?

Early evening I took her for a swim. She stayed in the longest amount of time yet and had fun paddling around and spashing, just doing duck stuff. When she got out she stood up and took 3 or 4 good steps toward me! Yay!🥳 She's spending a lot more time standing too. When we put the ducks up tonight we noticed her feathers are looking better too. Keep on getting better little girl!!!
Now I'm going to have to come up with a name for her.❤️🥰
 
This girl may have a chronic niacin deficiency causing the lameness. I strongly recommend you get Durvet high level Vit B complex and give her 1ml daily for 2 to 3 weeks and see if you get an improvement. You should be able to get DUrvet from a feedstore, but if you dont have one nearby, it is available from Amazon on line. It says its injectable, but we only use it orally in ducks. If your girl is eating, she may take 1ml each morning over a few treats -- mealworms or peas. When I needed to treat a duck for niacin deficiency, he wasn't eating and so I had to use a pipette to give in in his mouth to the side of his tongue, at the back of his bill. Its safer to give it on a treat!
High level Vit B Complex.JPG
 
This girl may have a chronic niacin deficiency causing the lameness. I strongly recommend you get Durvet high level Vit B complex and give her 1ml daily for 2 to 3 weeks and see if you get an improvement. You should be able to get DUrvet from a feedstore, but if you dont have one nearby, it is available from Amazon on line. It says its injectable, but we only use it orally in ducks. If your girl is eating, she may take 1ml each morning over a few treats -- mealworms or peas. When I needed to treat a duck for niacin deficiency, he wasn't eating and so I had to use a pipette to give in in his mouth to the side of his tongue, at the back of his bill. Its safer to give it on a treat!
View attachment 3602853
Thank you for that reply and I really appreciate the picture! Very helpful!
 
https://www.backyardchickens.com/ar...dications-to-all-poultry-and-waterfowl.73335/
Also you could put some shoes on her feet to help with keeping her feet flat. You can make them by cutting a plastic container the size of her feet wrap in tape or vet wrap to cover sharp edges then place her feet on the shoes the use vet wrap to attach to her feet go up around her ankle make it snug but not too tight it may cut off circulation. Keep her out of water while she has the shoes on. Bless you for taking in this duck she is def worth trying to help.
 
https://www.backyardchickens.com/ar...dications-to-all-poultry-and-waterfowl.73335/
Also you could put some shoes on her feet to help with keeping her feet flat. You can make them by cutting a plastic container the size of her feet wrap in tape or vet wrap to cover sharp edges then place her feet on the shoes the use vet wrap to attach to her feet go up around her ankle make it snug but not too tight it may cut off circulation. Keep her out of water while she has the shoes on. Bless you for taking in this duck she is def worth trying to help.
That's an interesting idea. Would a milk jug be heavy enough plastic or would I need something like an old bin?
 
Etsy also sells customizable duck splints that would hold the foot flat, but would make it hard to sleep and draw the foot under I think - you could take a look. Bless you for rescuing this duck!
 
I've named her Daisy. She still has trouble getting around but she's learning to be a duck. Looking like she maybe had an injury or deformity instead of vitamin deficiency but still giving all that. However, deformity doesn't make sense to me. If a duck is born with a deformity like this why would they be allowed to live like that? The scabs are still there but some have fallen off. The lady that took her to the auction claims she doesn't take in just anything, that she checks them out good, etc. If she did there's no way she could have missed this. The scabs prove she's been this way for some time. Her feathers were a mess because she was molting big time. Gave her extra protien with mealworms and she has nice feathers in now. Miss Goose taught Daisy about how good peas are to eat in the pool. Now Daisy not only looks forward to pool time every morning but eating peas too. I noticed Daisy wasn't foraging/noodling around like the others but this week we've brought her in at night with a dirty bill a few times. I guess she finally figured it out from watching the others. I'm glad cuz I was starting to get concerned. She's moving about the yard more. Spends longer amounts of time in the pool (last one out most always), which I think is good for her legs and feet not to mention her psyche.
I can't begin to imagine the environment she was living in to create a duck that doesn't know how to be a duck. I'm glad she's here, my 4 girls are quite entertaining. And don't forget the peas in the morning because they will all tell you! They'll meet you at the door a quackin for all they're worth!!! ❤️🥰 My son called yesterday morning when I was about to get the girls in the pool. It was quite noisy. I told him to hang on I had to get Daisy and DuckDuck in the pool then it would quiet down. 😂 I only give them a few peas at a time so Daisy gets more. Miss Goose is a Pea theif! She'll eat them all if she gets half a chance. I think she has radar for them. 😂 Pea eating also encourages Daisy to swim around more. She used to spend a lot of her pool time sitting on the blocks in the pool preening and splashing and just hanging out. I haven't seen much of that lately. She's mostly slowly paddling around.
 

New posts New threads Active threads

Back
Top Bottom