Angel Wing

[diggin'ducks]

I have noticed over the past few weeks that my 8 week Appleyard has a set of feathers sticking out on the left side. I have read about Angel Wing and I heard that you can wrap the wing and keep it close to the body, If I do that should I remove their acess to the duck pond ( baby pool ) I have for them to cool off in. I am in North Caroilna and it gets awful hot, and I don't want to deprive them of a cool swim. Please let me know, any advice would be appreciated.

 

[Wifezilla]

She will try to get the wrap off so I would keep her out of the pond until the wrap comes off. Good luck keeping it on her. It it hard to keep a duck wrapped even without water!

 

[diggin'ducks]

Sorry I did not respond sooner, but thanks for the response. Do you think that it is worth putting him through that? Could not wrapping it cause any long term damage or is it just that his wing will stick out and it has no affect on the health of the wing?

 

[cat1994]

diggin'ducks :

Sorry I did not respond sooner, but thanks for the response. Do you think that it is worth putting him through that? Could not wrapping it cause any long term damage or is it just that his wing will stick out and it has no affect on the health of the wing?

Well if you don’t wrap it won’t harm the duck he just won’t be able to fly ever, my lil call duck Angel has angel wing, she had it when I bought her as an adult so it was already too late to fix. She doesn’t even notice but I cut the feathers that stick out as sort as I can b/c I realized that the other ducks pick on the wing a lil when the feathers are really long.​

 

[diggin'ducks]

Thanks, I think I'm gonna try to wrap it and see if I can keep him as contained as possible so hopfully it will fix the problem.

 

[bayyjayy]

My first three ducks were Mallards, and I thought that one of my boys had broken his wing while I was trying to move them from their inside pen to their outside pen. I had never even heard of Angel Wing, so I just assumed it was broken...it was only on the one side. I am pretty sure that it is probably Angel Wing, and I never fixed it. He is fine, no one seems to pick on him at all. I had actually called a vet and asked about having it amputated (just the "broken" part, but she kinda laughed and said no. But, he is perfectly fine with it.

 

[JenniferK]

I noticed that one of my ducks had angel wing too and got some very good advice here. The first was a link to this video, which made it so much clearer how to do the taping:
http://www.phillipsmediaservices.com/anglewing56k.wmv

Here's a picture of my duck's taped wing: http://kirchmanfamily.smugmug.com/Animals/BYC/i-jGMXF5L/0/XL/DSC0035-XL.jpg

Because the wing was taped to itself she had better balance and mobility than if the tape had gone around her body. So I let mine swim and do everything as usual. The first day the tape came off and I had to redo it, but I did a better job the next time and it lasted. I can't remember the name of the tape, but it's stretchy and it sticks to itself, not the feathers. I learned that it wasn't quite sticky enough though, so I had to really tuck the ends under to secure it. But everything worked out, and my duck wasn't too inconvenienced.

Good luck.

 

[Oregon Blues]

Where are the feathers coming from?

If it is the actual wingtip turning out, the wing needs to be wrapped, or the wing will be permanently out of place.

However, almost all of my ducks get long fluffy feathers on their bodies below the wing that stick out during the time they are growing their first feathers. Those feathers look very odd, but are coming from the side of the chest, not the wing.

So step one is to determine where the funny feathers are growing and determine if the actual wing is turning. And depending upon what you are feeding, perhaps to cut the % of protein in the diet.