I’m truly stumped.
//Backstory
This spring we let my broody fawn and white runner sit on a nest, producing two eggs around three days till hatch. The eggs were taken out of the coup and put in an incubator due to their being Drakes, but sadly only one egg ended up hatching, producing a gorgeous little baby.
I’m pretty sure it’s an egg of my other fawn and white runner that has attached herself to my loving Cayuga drake, making this a runner x cayuga cross.
The first two weeks this babe was alone with its sole interaction being humans, but we decided to see if we could push our Metzers order scheduled for May earlier so it would have bird friends, not just us. In this order was five blue female blue runners, and a surprise black duckling and a surprise Gosling… yep. After a slow introduction they’re somewhat taking a liking to each other with the occasional “older sibling” nip.
Now the problem//
This isn’t my first set of ducklings. I supplement these babies with niacin and a tad bit of protein just because their food is only at 18%. They have a 6’x4’ enclosure with pine shavings as a base. At four weeks old Sunday, there are no other bad symptoms heath wise in my runnerXcayuga cross other than the fact it just does not like to do, well anything… It will get up, move around, eat and drink, and clean itself after baths no problem, but it just wants to either be laying down or doing the typical runner “sit on their haunches” pose. They all get frequent baths and with the food/supplement being right, I’m just at a point where I’m curious if it could be its breeding?
(cross babe, gosling, blue runner babe)
What do yall think?
Bonus pictures of last nights cuddle puddle with 3/8 of the babes
//Backstory
This spring we let my broody fawn and white runner sit on a nest, producing two eggs around three days till hatch. The eggs were taken out of the coup and put in an incubator due to their being Drakes, but sadly only one egg ended up hatching, producing a gorgeous little baby.
I’m pretty sure it’s an egg of my other fawn and white runner that has attached herself to my loving Cayuga drake, making this a runner x cayuga cross.
The first two weeks this babe was alone with its sole interaction being humans, but we decided to see if we could push our Metzers order scheduled for May earlier so it would have bird friends, not just us. In this order was five blue female blue runners, and a surprise black duckling and a surprise Gosling… yep. After a slow introduction they’re somewhat taking a liking to each other with the occasional “older sibling” nip.
Now the problem//
This isn’t my first set of ducklings. I supplement these babies with niacin and a tad bit of protein just because their food is only at 18%. They have a 6’x4’ enclosure with pine shavings as a base. At four weeks old Sunday, there are no other bad symptoms heath wise in my runnerXcayuga cross other than the fact it just does not like to do, well anything… It will get up, move around, eat and drink, and clean itself after baths no problem, but it just wants to either be laying down or doing the typical runner “sit on their haunches” pose. They all get frequent baths and with the food/supplement being right, I’m just at a point where I’m curious if it could be its breeding?
(cross babe, gosling, blue runner babe)
What do yall think?
Bonus pictures of last nights cuddle puddle with 3/8 of the babes
