My new ducks and an intro

[emsevers]

I just wanted to reintroduce myself in the duck section. I've asked a couple of questions here before but never as a duck owner. I've spent the last month or so trying to find Indian Runners and I finally found an ad on craigslist for 1 adult male named Jack and some ducklings, for free!! So we took the hour drive and came home with my new ducks. We are so excited! We've never had ducks before.

I'm not sure if you can tell the sex of the younger ones. They seem to be really young still. They don't really have very many feathers. I've researched a little about sexing but it all seems kind of iffy.

They are also really nervous. I'm not sure if that's just because they are in a new place or if they were just never handled. So I'm hoping that I can make them feel more comfortable.

Any advice for a new duck owner with nervous babies is appreciated! And I would love to know if you can sex tell the sex and what color they might be!

So here they are:

 

[1lpoock]

They're soo cute! And runners are just naturally skittish...they may calm down with some treats. And the male looks like a runner mutt, anyone else think that?

 

[Haley_LinckHillPoultry]

The male runners got the coloring of a khaki campbell! But I don't think there is a khaki campbell color variety of runner, so I'm going to have to agree with 1lpoock, and say the male is a mixing of the runner colors. It is in fact a pure runner, but not a "pure" color variety of the runner breed. He is very beautiful though. The other three look like blue runners, I'm not positive though, the only color variety of runner I own is fawn & white, so don't take me for granted on that.

Welcome to the world of duck owning though, ducks are great animals!

 

[emsevers]

Ok so you think that he is a full runner duck but the coloring is a mix? Did I get that right?

 

[Haley_LinckHillPoultry]

Yes, he is in fact, 100% pure indian runner duck. But he is not a pure color variety, example: runners come in fawn & white, white, fawn, blue, black. And the male is not any one of those colors, so he must be a color combination, like his mom could've been a white runner, and his dad could've been a blue runner.

 

[Goat_Walker]

Your babies are very similar in color to my buff crosses. They are SOOO CUTE!

 

[Wifezilla]

I got free ducks when I started too. Great "practice" ducks...LOL

Runners are pretty spazzy by nature, but they do respond very well to calm talking and treats. I got my runner as an adult and she went from being terrified of me to coming within one foot and "cooing" at me for treats. She still wont let me touch her, but my other ducks are my spoiled petting ducks. She lays lots of huge eggs and eats bugs, so I don't mind her being shy