mallard ducklings

[philipchickymad]

at wat age will a mallard start to fly and change colour

 

[duckman4450]

Hen mallards don't really "change" colors. As they get to 8ish weeks they start to lose their baby feathers and just get more dull feathers. Drakes on the other hand do the same thing, but at about 10ish weeks they start to get their "famous" drake coloring with the head and breast colors. It takes a few weeks for these to fully come in and they look like adult ducks! This is what I've noticed from my experiences

 

[philipchickymad]

what age are those ducklings in your profile picture as mine looks around the same age as they do

 

[duckman4450]

At the time of the picture, they were 2 or 3 days old. Extremely young

 

[cymbaline]

I second everything duckman said, except mine began to feather at just 2-3 weeks. By 4-5 weeks, pretty much all the baby feathers were gone, and by 6-7 weeks they could fly! lol

(Right at 3 weeks of age and getting quite a few "big duck" feathers. L to R, Turkey, Dexter, and Ruby)



(Ruby Sue, hatched approximately February 25, brought home on March 1, photo taken on April 19, but as I recall she was flying/gliding up to a week before that)

 

[duckman4450]

Holy cow Cymbaline!!! Mine must have just been slow growers! My drake started flying in tiny spurts at 10 weeks and couldn't fully fly until 14 weeks!!

 

[cymbaline]

Or maybe they were fast growers, lol...I'm thinking my little chunky-butt, Dexter, didn't start flying until a couple weeks after the girls, maybe because he was so much bigger. Turkey is the tiniest and she could fly way farther much sooner than the others. I checked back in my photos and Rocky started gliding around 7 weeks, flying soon after, but I think Dexter is gonna be bigger than him. Rocky's only about 2.5lbs. Poor Bullwinkle never was able to fly well because he's such a fattie, haha...I weighed him last summer at just 5-6 months old and he was a solid 3.5lbs...definitely on the large end for a mallard.