And One Lonely Muscovy...

[JacobAndDevorah]

To answer some of the questions:

1) We are pretty confident she is a female, but we are fairly new to this, so if someone looks at the pics and says otherwise, please let us know! This would also help us in determining if we should take on a couple of females, or a drake...

2) She came into the flock (gaggle?) with two Ancona females. They are younger than the rest of the birds, and it seems that the two she came with are lower in the pecking order, but still have been taken into the group, while the Muscovy never was part of anyone. Even when she came to us as a duckling, the two Anconas she came with we’re together, but she seemed off on her own.

3) We got all of our birds as babies and without knowing their genders. And we got pretty unlucky with the ducks (much more lucky with our chickens). So we have 15 ducks. 10 are drakes, and they are pretty...um...busy guys, if you know what I mean. Counting out Lonely Muscovy, who we believe is a female, we have five hens and the boys are interested in all of them except for the Lonely Muscovy, who they completely ignore.

4) I attached some pics showing how they all run together without her. She is always the one to the right kind of all by her lonesome. In the one with the pool they are drinking from the pool and she is drinking from a little puddle to the right. She seems so lonely. It makes us sad. When she does try to approach them they all run away. The chickens are usually around her, although she is clearly not one of them, either.

Thanks so much for responding. We want to figure out how to help her...or him? Getting your advice is really wonderful.

 

[Miss Lydia]

Beautiful female I'd try and find a couple females for her you def don't need any more drakes. It' not an easy thing to do but you really need to get your ration better too or your females [the mallard derived] are going to pay a steep price. The best ratio is 1 drake to at least 4 and up females.

 

[oldhenlikesdogs]

I personally think it looks like a drake. That would explain why it's staying away especially if you have other drakes. How old is it? That's too many drakes. They will damage the hens.

 

[Miss Lydia]

Maybe so, body just doesn't look long enough.

 

[oldhenlikesdogs]

Maybe so, body just doesn't look long enough.

It looks huge in that first photo, and if I'm correct and it's 4 months, than it looks just like one of my drakes from this year.

 

[Miss Lydia]

Well then OP needs to find more females, and decide which drakes need to go. If this one ends up being a drake too. I feel sorry for those females.

 

[Miss Lydia]

I went back and looked at pics of my scovys at 4 months and none of my females have carnucles so I do think you are right this is a drake.

 

[TheBeardie]

What noise does it make? It's honestly easier to sex with multiple ducks. This is my two roughly 4 month old muscovies.
The silver one is three days younger than the chocolate duck and has been twice her size for over a month.

The face on yours looks pretty red for a 4 month old female. I wait until they start hissing or don't when I don't have a similar aged duck. I'm 50/50 on the gender because of the age, if it was a few months older I'd definitely say female. But right now I'd say male.

I would separate and or get rid of some males. I've seen what a breeding party looks like with just two males, it's a wet and overly excited mess. They could seriously injure your girls.

That might be the problem, all those boys should be trying to mate with her, if she is female, if shes actually male and hasn't become Sexually active yet they might just be avoiding the larger male.

But if she's really female I'm not really sure why they would avoid her.

 

[oldhenlikesdogs]

I went back and looked at pics of my scovys at 4 months and none of my females have carnucles so I do think you are right this is a drake.

It's definitely harder to tell by pictures than in person, so I could be wrong too, but it looks big to me. My young hens are tiny compared to the males at about 4 month, which mine currently are as well. No real Carnacles on mine either yet.

 

[Miss Lydia]

Boy when it’s only one and young it can really be hard to guess about sex some of my females leg look thick but I always look at where their legs sit under their body females legs sit closer together together.