Mr. Mr. Mr. Mr. Mr. Mr. Mr. Mr. Mr. Mr. Mr. Miss - What do I do?

[micaheart]

I am a long time chicken owner but new to ducks. We got 9 baby bantam ducklings and 3 standard duclings. They are growing up and all appear to be drakes except for one little bantam gal. I can't imagine I can keep her with all of these boys! Do I pair her up with a little bantam guy and house them separately and then let all the boys live together? And is it OK if the full size boys live with the bantam boys? Yikes! Any help would be welcome. I just don't know how drakes act compared to roosters. Thank you.

 

[Wolfwoman]

Depends on if you want the upkeep with no return... if you are raising for eggs, I suggest keep one male and eat the rest. If they're for fun, see how they act as they grow and eat the mean ones...lol

 

[Jeeper1540]

wow lots of drakes. either congrats or im sorry! lol i dunno if you want them all. im hoping mine are all females and i think they are. im doing it as pets and for eggs

 

[CityChicker]

How do you know they are all drakes? If you are going by quacking, don't go by that. In my experience, that is not reliable at all with bantam ducks. I have kept them for years and have had literally dozens of hens that don't quack and about the same number of drakes that make an "almost" quack. Of course, some have very distinct male-female voices as well, but they are much fewer and farer between then with the larger breeds.

 

[Hattiegun]

Ill take your little girl heeeheeee

 

[chickboss]

I've heard the boys can live in a bachalor group if you want to keep them. If dinner isn't in your plans, but you don't want to keep that many, you could always post some ads. I would definantly only keep the one girl with one drake. Or you could start shopping for for more duckie wives, lol.

 

[Sweetfolly]

Quote:
Well, crap!

I just got 3 Call ducklings (started out with one, but there were two more that the buyer didn't show up for, so I ended up going back for them

) - she told me that you can't really tell by voice with the Calls, that you have to wait for the drake curl to come in. But that takes forever. Oh well. Guess I'll just go with unisex names.

micaheart - I hope you have more girls than it seems!

 

[vlapinta]

I hope thats true about calls because if I go by voice only 1 of my three quacks. I would hate to have 2 males and 1 female. I tried vent sexing but they all looked female to me. I guess I have to wait and see.

Vicki

 

[CityChicker]

I should heave prefaced my post with what I meant by bantam ducks, LOL. I meant the Aussie Spots, the Mini Appleyards, etc... I did not necessarily mean Calls, but it is interesting the lady told you that Annarie. I am probably not the best person to talk to about Calls because I have not raised a lot of them in the past. I do have a couple dozen Calls now though and I am really shocked at how quiet they are. I have always heard that Call hens are so loud. I never hear a peep out of any of mine (I have probably just been lucky so far though, LOL).

As far as the other bantam ducks previously mentioned that I have kept for a number of years, very few of my hens quack (certainly nothing like some of the larger breeds I have kept like Welsh Harlequins, Swedish, Campbells, etc...). I certainly couldn't sex them as youngsters based solely on sound. I still think that tameness has a big impact on how loud a domestic duck is. I know I have mentioned that before and a couple people here told me I didn't know what I was talking about, LOL. I have seen time and time again though that my loudest birds are the ones that were usually raised in smaller groups and are tamer individuals (hence someone that only keeps a small flock of pet ducks may notice a lot more loud quacking). The reasons for this should be obvious to most people that have studied animal behavior. Most of the birds that I have bought as adults (usually from larger farms) literally hardly make a sound.

 

[Sweetfolly]

Quote:
It's funny you should say that - I noticed while I was there that the mamma ducks were not loud AT ALL, and they sounded a little raspy. I've read here on BYC that female Calls are some of the loudest ducks there are, but they didn't seem loud at all to me - a little higher pitched, maybe, not definately not louder. I could definately tell the difference between the drake in the pen and the two ducks though!

Anyways, I didn't mean to hijack the thread - I'm just very excited about my little Call ducks, and I'm really crossing my fingers for at least one girl out of the three. I got them from AlpineRanch here on BYC.