Late development of cross beak

[Knighstar679]

I had a black East Indie that hatched almost a week ago now. At hatching the bill was a little bit small but not crossed.

last night when I took them to swim i noticed tht the bottom bill is now bigger than the top and it is skewed to one side.

I have read lots on birds hatching with this but not really ever found any cases that happened over time.

any thoughts as to if I can help fix this or is it doomed to get worse as it gets bigger

 

[Isadora]

How severe is it? Do you have a picture? I hadn't heard of it getting worse over time, but that doesn't mean it can't happen.
Meyer hatchery has a good article on it.
https://meyerhatchery.zendesk.com/h... crossed beak develops,a crossed beak to form.

 

[Knighstar679]

Here is the late development cross beak

 

[hfchristy]

How is the cross bill duckling doing?
It looks a lot like the one we had last year. It's hard to tell with the dark bills, but ours looked like there was maybe a scar across the curve, and I found a page somewhere that said that a bill can be cut during hatching and cause this sort of thing. As the healthy side kept growing, the scarred side didn't, so the curve got worse.
Besides making it harder to get enough food into her, she also had balance issues and kind of ran in circles and could not swim at all.
At least, we thought it was a hatch injury at the time... Do BEI have particularly sharp shells or more delicate bills? With the duck we got from you last year having the same issue, if this breed isn't more susceptible to bill injuries, it seems like you may need to consider a genetic factor to the problem.

Christy

 

[Knighstar679]

How is the cross bill duckling doing?
It looks a lot like the one we had last year. It's hard to tell with the dark bills, but ours looked like there was maybe a scar across the curve, and I found a page somewhere that said that a bill can be cut during hatching and cause this sort of thing. As the healthy side kept growing, the scarred side didn't, so the curve got worse.
Besides making it harder to get enough food into her, she also had balance issues and kind of ran in circles and could not swim at all.
At least, we thought it was a hatch injury at the time... Do BEI have particularly sharp shells or more delicate bills? With the duck we got from you last year having the same issue, if this breed isn't more susceptible to bill injuries, it seems like you may need to consider a genetic factor to the problem.

Christy

I don’t think that they have particularly sharp shells. I think that might depend on the diets of the stock that laid it.

“Hotlips” is still running around the cross hasn’t gotten any worse that I can tell. Though she is the runt of all the ducklings she hatched with. She eats pretty good.

I haven’t heard of BEIs being prone to cross bill. This is the first one I have hatched. Though I have hatched two other runts. (One bei and one welsh).
I didn’t notice any bill injury to this one but I could be wrong

 

[hfchristy]

I'm glad to hear she's doing well.
Are all your ducks bantams? Ours were supposed to have been, but several grew up to be quite large ducks. The combo of runt + much smaller breed ended up being a problem. They didn't outright bully her, but she was always last to eat and tended to keep her distance from them, even at night. We had a cold night last fall and I carried her into the duck house because I didn't think she had the sense to go in on her own, but she must have wandered out later. We found her frozen little body the next morning.
So, definitely keep an eye out for bullying.

 

[Knighstar679]

I'm glad to hear she's doing well.
Are all your ducks bantams? Ours were supposed to have been, but several grew up to be quite large ducks. The combo of runt + much smaller breed ended up being a problem. They didn't outright bully her, but she was always last to eat and tended to keep her distance from them, even at night. We had a cold night last fall and I carried her into the duck house because I didn't think she had the sense to go in on her own, but she must have wandered out later. We found her frozen little body the next morning.
So, definitely keep an eye out for bullying.

I have a few Welshies for eggs everyone else is a bantam. I have been watching for bullying on “Hotlips” so far there hasn’t been, but I have a strong sense that that won’t last. But so far she is able to eat, just has slow growth going on.