Growth and behavior questions and some pictures

[griemar]

Hello everyone, I come to you once again with more questions and even a few updates.

Howard (our Fawn/White Runner) and Lewie (our Blue Swedish) are both coming along well with gaining trust in us as parents. However we are finding that with trust comes issues, lol. Tonight Howard finally ate out of my wifes hand for the very first time. I was so proud of him! Until it then moved beyond just eating and progressed to almost aggressive biting! After a few ouch's and I told my wife to gently hold his beak shut, he settled down and lay'd next to us and fell asleep. Lewie witnessed this breakthrough and though he seem'ed tempted to try the eating from her hand, he refused and instead followed Howard's example and bit my wife a few times. The same punishment gave the same results and they have calmed since. My question is, is the biting intentional, are they testing their boundaries since just ducklings or is this a sign of possible aggression issues?

Also, since the first day we got them, they both like to be on our shoulders. This has never been an issue and to be honest, we both thought it was rather cute. However tonight we had another first when Howard decided to grab a mouth full of my wifes hair and tried to swallow it. My wife thankfully managed to get the hair out of his mouth, but not without a stream of rather loud peeps and some flapping around. Is going after a persons hair normal? I was thinking it may resemble worms to them and that's why he tried to eat it.

A question about growth. Howard has doubled if not more in size since I bought them May 9th. Lewie however has barely grown much, I'd estimate maybe 1 1/2 times the size of when we got him and he's now about half the size of Howard. Do the two breeds grow differently or should I be concerned about possible fighting over food ect? I know ducklings grow like weeds, I just didnt expect such a difference.

Finally, how do I sex them?!?!? My wife has decided on their names but we have no clue as to what sex they are, lol. Any pointers would be great.

Here's some pics:

 

[Fawkes]

The biting probably isn't aggressive, he might have wanted more food. My Scout also just chews on me for fun and he's starting to get to the age where it actually hurts. He also loves perching on my shoulders, most ducklings seem to like to. Scout used to try to eat my hair, actually he used to try to eat everything, but he's gotten much better. Part of it is that he seems to apparently just lost interest in it. I think thats just another normal duckling thing.

Sorry, I have no idea how to sex those breeds.

 

[DuckyMom]

Often times ducklings will attempt to "preen" you. I have notice theyre alittle less gentle than adults. I doubt you'll have to worry about aggression from such a young duckling.
I love the shoulder perching! (that is definatly a runner thing

)I have a one year old runner who never grew out of it! Boy do I get some funny looks walking around with a duck on my shoulder. As for eating hair, out of all my ducklings I have never had one try to do that. I would assume your right with your worm theory.
All ducklings grow at diffrent rates. As long as Lewie is eating enough I wouldn't worry, he'll catch up.
When it comes to sexing runner ducklings there are 2 ways to tell, vent sexing, and quacking. They look alittle too old to vent sex and alittle too young to tell from quacks. Wait a few weeks, If theyre boys the quacks will stay raspy, If theyre girls there will be a deffinate diffrence.

I have a question about theyre coloring, you said you have one fawn and white one blue swed? In your pictures it looks like you have a black runner and a blue swede.

Good luck with the new babies!

Emily

 

[gofasterstripe]

wheres the F&W Runner

 

[griemar]

Quote:
I was thinking the exact same thing but haven't mentioned it yet. Ibought them from a local farm and Tac store and that's how they rang them up. Lewie I been thinking is a Black Runner for sure, but Howard I have been waiting for his feathers to come in so I can get a better idea of his/her colors.

Thanks for confirming my suspicions, lol.

 

[DuckiesAndBees]

I called the feed store the other day to see if they had ducks and if so what breed. They told me "yellow."