Silver pintails breeding age

[adriano]

Hi.

I have two bahama pintail drakes aged 2yrs app.

And i have two silver pintail ducks aged 8 months.

My question is a what age will the silvers breed.

And also would an older duck try to breed with a young duck even though they may not be mature to lay yet.

Cheers

 

[1lpoock]

Yes they might try to mate with each other. However bahama pintails are usually second year fertile, so you might not get eggs this year.

 

[Boggy Bottom Bantams]

was going to say the same thing. I have had them go to 3 before getting any. Yearlings, if they even lay, usually are sterile, the older boys may help, set them for sure if you do get any to see. But wouldnt count on it til next year.
Most all wild waterfowl arent productive til 2-3 years 4 on some of the seaducks. Lots of folks will tell you different, but with the thousands I have kept, this tends to be the general rule on most.
As for interspecies mixing, keep domestics out of your wild pens and you'll not have much trouble. My main waterfowl aviary was 1/4 acre fully covered and loaded with cover, ponds, etc. out of many mant years of keeping 40-60 species in there. I only ended up with 4-5 cross breeds. Main wood ducks over something else, redheads and pintails mainly.
For them most part each sticks with it's own kind which was a big part of what I love about them over domestics. You put 10 breeds of domestics in a pen and you'll never get a pur baby.
Good luck with them, those are very nice birds!
Aubrey