Muscovy "underdog" almost never stops preening, what could be wrong?

[princessmama]

He's been slower to mature than the others, took longer to lose his voice and still has juvy feathers.

I have only four ducks left, two drakes and two hens. This guy hangs out by himself, cleaning his feathers. He gets soaked whenever he gets in the pond. Could he be sick?

The rest of the crew

 

[sfw2]

It sounds like he might have a problem with his oil gland. He's trying to coat his feathers, to stay drier in the water.

 

[princessmama]

That's what I was thinking after watching him for a while. He doesn't seem lethargic. He'll come up with the others and eat if he's not busy preening.

 

[MDC]

To me that photo appears to be of a she rather than a he. How old are they? Young Muscovy molt at about 12-14 weeks so it could be possible that (s)he's molting which could make it want to preen a bit more.

Does it have access to fresh water to bathe? Usually ducks that do have few problems with external parasites but that's something to consider.

Just by looking at the photo, (s)he appears to be in good health, the eyes are bright and clear w/o any discharge or foamy eye, the nostrils are clear w/o discharge. The feathers don't appear to be in all that bad of condition considering. The caruncling is nice and bright. Have you held the bird and is (s)he in good condition weight-wise? If you don't already, feeding BOSS helps a lot with feather condition.

 

[princessmama]

I'm assuming "he" because he's lost his voice and only hisses now and the other drake chases him away. They hatched in May. They have access to two ponds and a couple buckets of water. Picked him up recently and he seems fine. Smaller than the others and thinner, but not extremely so. I know he gets chased away from the food often and we make sure to put some food off to the side for him.