Depressed Duck? HELP Please.

[nolamimi504]

The few other threads I’ve read about depressed ducks involve the duck being traumatized or the loss of another duck. We have 11 ducks, 9 who are currently outside, the other 2 are only 7 weeks olds, too young to be introduced to the rest of them just yet; 4 of my outside ducks are our original ducks, they will be 1 next month, the other 5 are three months old. One of my original 4 ducks, Goldie (Pekin and was the only female till the other 5) had been confined to her house for the past couple of weeks, she had been limping and what appeared to be the start of bumble foot; she’s no longer limping-stopped a couple days ago. Prior to the hurt foot, she preferred to spend her days in her house away from the drakes, which was understandable; her mate and housemate is Midnight (Cayuga, also one of my original 4), when it’s just him & her all is fine. He’s not in her face bobbing his head or squawking, just follows Goldie around; however, if the other two drakes are out with him and they start crowding Goldie, squawking in her face, he starts also…now, if the 4 are out together and the 3 drakes begin crowding her, she will back away and go in her hidey hole, behind the wheelbarrow, usually my husband or I will then put one of the other drakes, Half-pint (aka. Osama-the terrorist of the group and shit-starter-pardon the French), or Chocolate in their house for a time-out. She had been staying in her house all day either till it was time for the other 2 drakes to go in their side of the house, now she will usually wait till the girls and the other two drakes are inside their houses before she comes out because of this we put the other ducks inside their sides of the house around 6:00 so Goldie has a couple hours of daylight left to forage but most times she prefers to stay outside most of the night with Midnight right next to her on the back porch. Goldie is given her pelleted dry food, fresh water, even some corn, peas and carrots during treat time, sometimes bananas, romaine, or watermelon in her pool as well. My husband will sometimes catch dragon flies and give them to the ducks and she’s always the first one to get any since she stays in her house. Yesterday, I noticed she didn’t really eat any of her corn or peas…today, she refused a dragon fly, just looked so depressed and didn’t even get in her pool after we cleaned it, which we do every morning. I don’t think she got in yesterday either. Today, she just looked so depressed. My husband took her out her house and brought her inside to put her in the tub, she didn’t even squawk at him like she normally would do, nor did she when I approached the tub or went in the bathroom like she normally would. I’m really beginning to worry about her. This morning when my husband went to empty her pool, he saw Midnight on top of her, not in the pool; she started squawking at him, my husband was going to stop him but then Midnight had already finished and as he went to get off her, rolled over onto his back. I really need help with Goldie as to why she would be depressed and what I can do to help her? We have an appointment with the LSU Veterinary School for Monday morning, we don’t have any avian vets where we live, as it’s a small town; the appointment was originally made early this week for one of the babies (7 weeks old), who jumped out of my husband’s arms when he was putting them in their little tub one morning and had been limping, my husband was worried he might have broken his leg, thigh or hip but he seems to be improving and putting weight on that foot again, rather than canceling the appointment we were thinking of keeping it for Goldie but what can a vet do if she’s depressed. Please, Please, Please HELP! I should add that we have noticed that she seemed to possibly be losing weight over the last couple of weeks but not sure how to tell if she has been or not.

 

[Miss Lydia]

Think about it if you were being accosted by drakes continually how would you feel? okay, do you know when she laid last? since she isn't eating there could be a possibility she is egg bound or has an infection or is just is depressed from the attention the drakes are giving her. How many drakes do you have and females?
I think it's a very good idea to take Goldie in for the apt. have a good examination and find out if there is more going on than just too much attention from the drakes.

 

[nolamimi504]

Think about it if you were being accosted by drakes continually how would you feel? okay, do you know when she laid last? since she isn't eating there could be a possibility she is egg bound or has an infection or is just is depressed from the attention the drakes are giving her. How many drakes do you have and females?
I think it's a very good idea to take Goldie in for the apt. have a good examination and find out if there is more going on than just too much attention from the drakes.

Thank you for your reply. My husband & I had decided we would take her to the emergency vet in Baton Rouge (about an hour away) but I had to run to Walmart and get dog food and a few other things. As I was checking out, he messaged me saying she was dying, I thought he was exaggerating as he normally does but I checked out and rushed home, half a mile away, I even out my emergency lights on and ran the one red light. I pulled in and he had her in his arms and I told him to take the stuff out the front of the truck so we could go and I took Goldie from him and went and sat on the sofa with her and tried to give her water with a dropper, even though she had been drinking. My husband emptied the truck as fast as he could just tossing the stuff in the living room and kitchen floor. As I was holding Goldie, she had what appeared to be a seizure and she had quit breathing and her heart had stopped. I quickly googled duck CPR and began breathing into her bill and giving her compressions; minute or two later, my husband said let’s go and I told him, no yet, she stopped breathing and I was trying CPR. He came over and said she’s gone and to give her to him and I refused. I told him wait, her heart might start again. He said, “she’s stiff, Bridget.” She was and I knew it. I wrapped her in a soft blanket and held her as I sobbed and apologized to her. I could swear I heard her trying to breathe but I hadn’t, it was more hope. I just held her for about an hour, telling my husband I wanted to get her stuffed not buried. He entertained the idea and later said, we need to bury her tomorrow if I was okay with that; he’s going to make her a wooden box and we’re gonna bury her under the oak tree in our front yard. I do worry how Midnight will react when he realizes tomorrow that she’s gone. I’m heartbroken and never knew losing one of my ducks could hurt as much as it does, but she was special and my girl.

To answer your questions for future reference, we have 10 more ducks. Goldie began laying her first egg in January. She stopped two months later, we assumed that this was her first clutch, which consisted of just over 50 eggs, which we incubated a few of them and hatched 7 ducklings total. To avoid all the drakes wanted to mount her, my husband separated the house into two sections and we placed two of the drakes in one section and kept Midnight with her cuz that was her sidekick and always had been. For the longest time, we kept Chocolate, one of the other two drakes inside since he was always in Goldie’s face when he was out. It helped…when we introduced the other girls to the rest of the flock, things improved some. Goldie didn’t seem interested in socializing with them but she was housebound with her foot and she seemed to prefer her house, she would swim and take baths throughout the day, was treated like a queen by my husband & I, we did our best to keep Midnight from mounting her without her giving him the okay and laying flat in the pool. Originally, when we first took in the 4 orphaned ducks we thought we had 2 males and 2 females, which turned into 3 males and a female; we hatched 5 more females and a 6th 7 weeks ago but she won’t be introduced into the flock till she’s older. Now it’s 6 females and 3 males plus we have a 7-week old male. We knew the ratio wasn’t ideal, which is why we began separating them into male and female housing. We didn’t know at first and learned; since getting the 4 ducks almost a year ago, I’ve done a lot of reading and research and BYC has become my go-to forum for advice or just to read and become informed. We had become attached to the 4 after discovering we really needed more females that my husband didn’t want to get rid of any of them. When she had bumblefoot, we would soak her feet in very epsom salt soak for 5-10 mins daily, she would go into a cool bath for a few minutes and then we would put clear iodine on the little scab after her bath, even once the scan came off, we would put a little on the area. We had a friend down the street who has ducks and suggested we give her Penicillin G for a few days, every other day- he said it was an infection. We did just that… every other day we would give her 1/4cc of the Pen G, which made the swelling go down and her foot seemed to heal within a week and a half, she was no longer limping. Did we treat her foot wrong? I’m questioning everything we did now. Goldie received extra special treatment from us…

I did make a little video montage to remember her but it wouldn’t let me upload it.

 

[Miss Lydia]

Oh my gosh I am so sorry to hear about Goldie. Bless your heart for trying to revive her. I want to apologize for coming across harsh, we just see this so much where there are too many drakes and it always seems there is one female they target.
I'd def say there was more going on with Goldie than the drakes. They are so good at hiding any sickness till almost too late and most of the time too late that there isn't much we can do.
It's heartbreaking and can make us feel so guilty but most of the time there just anythng we can do.
You could think about a necrospy that would give you an answer to what was going on.
Please just know you probably wouldn't have had a better outcome if you had taken her in before Walmart, at least she was home in a loving environment instead of the stress of a vets office.

 

[Beaglegal]

I'm sorry for your loss...I would agree necropsy can provide valuable information

 

[Newfowler1]

So sad. My heart goes out to you and your family.
unfortunately a necropsy often done by Dept of Ag might not release her after the fact, usually the animals are not given back afterwards to prevent possible spread of disease and contagion.
I didn’t want to go that route so I could take her home but I elected to have the necropsy done to protect the others in my flock. They live in our hearts and memories not just in flesh and bone.