Hen or drake?

[Horsebackgurl98]

4 week old mallard or poss mallard mix. Any ideas on hen or drake? All 3 identical look identical. Vent sexed. Thought one was a male (Yes I'm experienced actually a vet tech) but all have female looking feathers.. any opinions?

 

[Trisseh]

All ducklings regardless of gender will have identical juvenile plumage. You won’t be able to tell by feathers until they molt their baby feathers and start growing in adult feathers. By 8 weeks you should be able to tell by their voices. Girls male that quintessential quack! Where boys are raspy and much quieter. I call my boys my chain smokers. Boys will also make baby peeps a lot longer than the girls will. At this age their phallus should theoretically be easy enough to spot if your technique is right, but I’ve had some tricky fellows who suck that thing way up in there so I use it as a single part of a multi faceted approach to figuring out gender. Lol.
You’re welcome to take a video of them talking, upload it to a platform like YouTube, and link to it here. That may help us give you a better idea based on sound.

 

[Trisseh]

Oh, and I would be very surprised if these guys are actually 8 weeks. They look closer to 4, based on feathering. They should be fully feathered by 8 weeks...

 

[Horsebackgurl98]

I did mean 4 weeks my apologies

 

[Trisseh]

A bit too early for voices then. 6-8 weeks their voices will start changing. Although I have one 3 week old duckling that is trying to quack already, so some of them can be early bloomers! Lol.

 

[Horsebackgurl98]

A bit too early for voices then. 6-8 weeks their voices will start changing. Although I have one 3 week old duckling that is trying to quack already, so some of them can be early bloomers! Lol.

I thought I read that the colors as the different when they feather out at first.

 

[Magnolia Ducks]

No they look the same until they start to get adult feathers then their heads will start to turn.

 

[Trisseh]

I thought I read that the colors as the different when they feather out at first.

Sexual dimorphism in the plumage doesn’t come until later, same as bill color, etc. The earliest indication is the voice. There are a couple of domesticated breeds that have different things like bill color and feathering around the tail early on, that differs. But all juvenile plumage is various shades of the same for both sexes until their first molt, especially for the “wild” coloured ones.

 

[Horsebackgurl98]

First video

 

[Isaac 0]

A bit too young to accurately voice sex, post back here in a few weeks with a video, and we should be able to tell.

They're adorable!