What gender? Rouen and Khaki Campbell ducklings

[jeremy]

I know they aren't the best pictures, but they're the only ones the seller provided.
I'm thinking about buying these two ducks from CL, I just wanted to see if anybody could tell the sex, I know they're young.
What do you think???

 

[shelleyd2008]

It's impossible to tell by looks at that age. When you go to look at them, listen to their 'quacks'. Males of that size will still be mostly peepy (for quite a while actually), and the females might have a peep but should have a loud 'wack!' as well. I'll find some youtubes of duck sounds to help you know what to listen for

 

[shelleyd2008]

This is a female: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ejJnoyN8V6g

These are both male:

 

[ranchhand]

In the first pic, am I seeing green on the head of the one up front? If so, it's a drake for sure. I don't know about the other one.

 

[shelleyd2008]

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I thought so too, but if it's big enough to get the green head, it should have a white bar starting on the front of the neck??

 

[Olive Hill]

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Not so. I have known more than one female rouen duck to have some green sheen to her head, especially when young.

 

[jrobertson]

when trying to sex my young mallards i noticed that all my birds had a hint of green on there head even though there were 4 drakes and 4 ducks. the green head is always last in my flock. when my males molt the get the steel gray coming in first, then the mulberry chest and once those have pretty much came in all the way, then the head turns green. may be different in others experiences. also the bill color can help you in sexing young birds. the drakes will tend to have a bright yellow or dark greenish blue looking bill and the hens will have a orangish yellow and black bill. but quacks are the best answer. if it quacks it is definatley a girl. if it doesn't it is a boy or still to young to quack.

 

[shelleyd2008]

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I can't believe I forgot about the bills! I just today noticed in my flock of rouens that the ducks had yellow and black bills and the drakes have all-yellow bills! My young rouen drake looked just like a duck FOREVER except for the white band on the front of the neck when he was about 6-8 weeks old. Now at almost 6 months he's finally looking like a drake.

As far as the sounds, even the babies have different sounding peeps if you are around a lot of baby ducks you can start to tell them very early.

But definitely go by the sound, most of my large breed ducks started quacking under stress around 2-3 weeks old.

ETA: By 'stress' I mean picking them up normally, I don't handle mine much

Baby rouen duck would say 'peep! peep! WACK! at 2 or 3 weeks old

 

[TrystInn]

It's very tough to tell by this age but my best guess is that's a female Rouen and likely a KC drake.

Listen to the quacks - drakes will sound hoarse, like they have a bad throat cold. Girls will have a sharper, cackle-like quack. I always describe it as sounding like your overweight, drunk auntie at the family reunion laughing at her own joke!

 

[jeremy]

The ducklings are approx. 5 weeks old, will you be able to distinguish quacks with a good amount of certainty at this age?
I'm really excited about this find, I've emailed the OP on CL. Cross your fingers for me that they're still available!