Welsh Harlequin ducks?

[Crazy4Fowl]

Thanks for al the answers, we are going to try to get a WH at our local Rural King when the ducks come in next week. They don't know what breeds they are getting but when I go I will ask them to order WH

 

[Crazy4Fowl]

We love our WH! She is so sweet, quiet, great layer, and has this funny quirk of running up behind your foot while you're walking. Once you turn around to see what she's doing, she stops suddenly and looks around like "What? I've been here the whole time..."

We love our Golden 300, too. Good personality, great layer. We also have a Cayuga, Black Runner, Peking, and Black Swedish. They each have their own fun personality, and we are loaded with eggs. In the dead of winter, we are still getting 3-4 eggs every day. Back in the fall, we were getting 5-6 daily. We just love our girls, and don't know how we managed life before ducks!

What duck is your favorite, that you own. Is it the cayuga, golden, wh, etc?

 

[tnewton]

Oh, I don't know that I could choose! They are all so beautiful, and each have a distinct personality. The Cayuga can be a bit aggressive towards the other ducks when she wants something, but no more than the usual pecking order stuff I think. The Peking has a little leg deformity from growing faster as a duckling than I could get niacin in her. But she is also the calmest when being picked up. The Black Runner is probably the one that's attached to me the most. She follows me around and actually crawled into my lap a couple of times.

The Black Swedish is as big as the Peking, but isn't aggressive at all. She's our jumper - always jumping onto whatever she can reach, and much higher than we expected! She also makes her wishes very clear for a full swimming pool. Her communication skills are impressive! Our Golden 300 is calm and sweet. She's the fastest runner when I bring the mealworms out.

And of course, you already heard about our Welsh Harlequin. What a sweet duck.

When I chose ducklings, I knew I wanted different varieties that were calm, would be good with our kids, and would become good layers. What we didn't expect was how much personality they would have, how silly they could be, or how much we would love them. I hope you have as much fun with your little ones!

 

[allergymama]

 

[Crazy4Fowl]

Oh, I don't know that I could choose! They are all so beautiful, and each have a distinct personality. The Cayuga can be a bit aggressive towards the other ducks when she wants something, but no more than the usual pecking order stuff I think. The Peking has a little leg deformity from growing faster as a duckling than I could get niacin in her. But she is also the calmest when being picked up. The Black Runner is probably the one that's attached to me the most. She follows me around and actually crawled into my lap a couple of times.

The Black Swedish is as big as the Peking, but isn't aggressive at all. She's our jumper - always jumping onto whatever she can reach, and much higher than we expected! She also makes her wishes very clear for a full swimming pool. Her communication skills are impressive! Our Golden 300 is calm and sweet. She's the fastest runner when I bring the mealworms out.

And of course, you already heard about our Welsh Harlequin. What a sweet duck.

When I chose ducklings, I knew I wanted different varieties that were calm, would be good with our kids, and would become good layers. What we didn't expect was how much personality they would have, how silly they could be, or how much we would love them. I hope you have as much fun with your little ones!

I agree with @allergymama

 

[Crazy4Fowl]

Thanks hopefully I will have a good time with my goldens! Maybe as welsh too!

 

[Sfraker]

We chose Welsh Harlequins because of the calm demeanor and egg laying ability. My girls were hatched on 2/24/14. Started laying the end of July 2014 and 3 of the 4 have not stopped. one stopped laying mid-december I think.

They are always underfoot, I have to be really careful not to step on toes when I am in the pen or coop. They are very friendly and are always looking to see what you are doing. A local breeder warned me to never garden with them because you will trip over them and hurt them or yourself. He was right! When I'm squatted down in the garden it's not unusual to have a duck underneath me, pulling out the seedlings as I put them in the ground! Naughty ducks!

We also have 2 pekins, 1 cayuga, 1 khaki campbell and 2 buff ducks that we adopted as adults. They are all noisier and less friendly, but the friendliness could be because we didn't have them as ducklings.

I LOVE them all but the WH are my favorites, gorgeous, tons of eggs and friendly!

 

[Crazy4Fowl]

We chose Welsh Harlequins because of the calm demeanor and egg laying ability. My girls were hatched on 2/24/14. Started laying the end of July 2014 and 3 of the 4 have not stopped. one stopped laying mid-december I think.

They are always underfoot, I have to be really careful not to step on toes when I am in the pen or coop. They are very friendly and are always looking to see what you are doing. A local breeder warned me to never garden with them because you will trip over them and hurt them or yourself. He was right! When I'm squatted down in the garden it's not unusual to have a duck underneath me, pulling out the seedlings as I put them in the ground! Naughty ducks!

We also have 2 pekins, 1 cayuga, 1 khaki campbell and 2 buff ducks that we adopted as adults. They are all noisier and less friendly, but the friendliness could be because we didn't have them as ducklings.

I LOVE them all but the WH are my favorites, gorgeous, tons of eggs and friendly!

Thanks. I'm definitely gonna try to get some. I told my mom and she said it would be a good idea to get 1 or 2 hopefully we can get some, we are hoping to get them at Rural King because they don't charge shipping because we go pick them up at our nearest store. But we have to go there thursday and ask if they can order some wh ducks and hopefully they will.

 

[terris]

I hope you were able to find the WH. Our girls arrived from Metzer Farms yesterday. Surprisingly, Megan is much darker than Maggie. I wonder if that means anything in terms of adult plumage. Does anyone know? WH are an awesome breed. I do not see us having anything else (at least for this year).

Also Mom to 2 Mallards, Oliver and Mimic.

 

[Sfraker]

I have not found any correlation between duckling fuzz color and adult plumage with my WH. We named our one duckling that had almost a black head Duck Vader. She ended up a fairly light WH as an adult.