What is my duckling?

[El359]

Hi

This is my first time raising a duckling.

We got an Aylesbury duck about 7 weeks ago. Little Puck was around a week old when we got him. We specifically wanted a drake as we already have two females and wanted to breed our ducks. The breeder told us she had vented them and was definitely giving us a male. However as times gone on, he is still continuing to make a lot of noise and isn’t overly big. I have a family member who has a lot of experience with ducks and said that at this age, if my duck was male he wouldn’t be making as much noise... my duck constantly chirps and like, squeaks and is very loud. Any thoughts on whether we have a male or female?

We also had to take puck to the vets yesterday as his eyes were very red. The vet didn’t check gender for us and said his eyes were just irritated, possibly from the bedding we were used or maybe some perfume on me or the washing powered we were using. He also said that our duck is special needs. He suspects the duck maybe inbred or had taken a blow to the head in the first few days of being born, as his legs are perfectly fine but his feet point inwards and his balance is terrible. Eve when preening, he will often topple over or lose his balance slightly.

 

[Stipenvlerk]

Hi @El359

for your question about male/female please upload a video of him/her making sound on YouTube and post a link here so we can hear it.

for your question about being an inbred because of the feet pointing inwards and the unstable standing, please read @Isaac 0 ‘s topic about niacin deficiency.
can that be the case here? what are you feeding your duck?

https://www.backyardchickens.com/threads/niacin-deficiency-in-waterfowl.1367557/

O, and welcome to BYC

 

[El359]

Hi @El359

for your question about male/female please upload a video of him/her making sound on YouTube and post a link here so we can hear it.

for your question about being an inbred because of the feet pointing inwards and the unstable standing, please read @Isaac 0 ‘s topic about niacin deficiency.
can that be the case here? what are you feeding your duck?

https://www.backyardchickens.com/threads/niacin-deficiency-in-waterfowl.1367557/

O, and welcome to BYC

Hi

thanks for replying. I asked the vet about niacin deficiency, however we’ve been feeding him brewers yeast since we got him, the vet said there’s definitely no deficiency in him. He gave us some probiotics for his gut to help him a bit, as he’s been a bit down the last few days and not really eating properly.

I’ll get a video of him making noise and post it later

 

[Isaac 0]

What brand of Brewer's Yeast are you using? If you look at the other link in my signature, you'll see that Brewer's yeast is not the best niacin supplement out there, I was able to find a plentiful amount of brands where the niacin content was low. I'm able to back this up with many people's ducks who suffered from a niacin deficiency even with Brewer's Yeast supplementation.

Just to be sure, get us a vide of him walking, you'll need to upload it to a video platform like Youtube/Vimeo and copy/paste the link here.