🥳Welcoming Danae ! 🥳

[Cassandra Lana]

Today I have added one more female duck to my flock. I have named her Danae . She is a Indian Runner. She is veryyyyy shy and I have to work with her before letting her play in the run.

Her history= my riding barn had 6 ducks that used to be all boys. They stayed with 3 geese and were barely handled . When they were handled it was children chasing them to pick them up. She is also not used to having a lot of water as the geese would bully the ducks away from it and spill it everywhere.

I now have her because used-to-be-he switched genders and is now a girl. That caused problems so when I asked if I could have her the previous owner said yes and I have brought her home.
She got beat up by 5 males before being removed so she got these dirt clog things
I am working on removing
This thread is a blog style thing about the progress she will making. Please feel free to post tips look forward to seeing and hearing from u in da comments

 

[sourland]

Beak color makes me think that 'she' may be a drake. Well done on the rescue.

 

[fatty and friends]

Beak color makes me think that 'she' may be a drake. Well done on the rescue.

beak color isn’t a real way to tell a ducks gender, one of my girls had a bright green beak and one of my drakes is just now (10 months old) starting to get a “drake color” beak

 

[sourland]

beak color isn’t a real way to tell a ducks gender, one of my girls had a bright green beak and one of my drakes is just now (10 months old) starting to get a “drake color” beak

I'm fully aware of that fact - that's why I said 'may be'. OP says that at one point all were regarded as drakes. Ducks do not change gender, and drakes will gang up on and breed the least dominant drake in an all drake flock.

 

[Cassandra Lana]

I think she is a girl cause her quack and coloring has to female. Also the drakes just started picking on her after these changes

 

[Cassandra Lana]

Day 2 ! I introduced Danae to the flock this morning. The other girl ducks liked her immediately but the drake took a few hours (her posture made him feel chased) the chickens took all day .

I got both dirt clots off her face and there was no injury underneath (although I put medicine on anyway.

she quickly understood the feeder and duck water . I also got her to eat lettuce from my hand (when I was taking the clots off) and spinach that was sprinkled around.

she is super nervous about being approached but enjoys being held and snuggled. I think I will try getting her to come closer to me on her own using mealworms tomorrow

also she is definitely a girl and layed an egg !

 

[Percipen]

Shes such a cutie! The "gender changing" thing is so strange. I took a pic of the explanation in one of my duck books by Roland Ruthersdale. Sounds like shes coming around if shes laying and loving snuggles

 

[Cassandra Lana]

Day 3/4

She will come within 4ish feet of me for worms although she has not really realized that you need to eat as many worms as possible not pick out the best ones

she needs to be held and guided up the ramp at night although I expect her to need that another month of two. she is very good about coming out in the morning, she’s actually better than one of my original ducks

 

[Cassandra Lana]

Week one: she is doing good. Will come near to me but not my hands . She is learning to eat worms quickly and has agested to life in my flock .

 

[Cassandra Lana]

Week 2
She is getting better! She is slowly getting friendlier. She still doesn’t like the ramp to the coop but will happily let me carry her to put her in (much less running away) . She has been introduced to leafy treats and likes them.

She also will not go anywhere near the dogs but that makes sense cause her previous owner’s sheep dog insisted on helping herd the ducks. She never went after them just chased them in there pen then walked away.