What is a male duck called? Drakes Review: The Importance of Male Ducks in Nature. Characteristic external differences of drakes

Both hunters and farmers need to be able to determine the sex of ducks. During the hunting period, shooting of drakes is permitted. The females are left so that they can later breed offspring, increasing the number of livestock within their breed. Farmers raise ducks for both meat and eggs. Males gain body weight faster. In a short period of fattening, they show better productivity.

For meat production, it is preferable to breed males rather than females. At the same time, females are taken to produce duck eggs. Males in poultry farms are kept to create bird families and to obtain hatching eggs. How to distinguish a duck from a drake? What should you pay attention to?

More than 150 species of ducks live in nature. Some of them are commercial. Duck drakes wild breeds They are distinguished by their bright plumage. IN mating season The color of their feathers becomes rich and bright. Females, on the contrary, are modest in their attire. Most often it is monochromatic, gray, brown, red. Feathers form an ornament on the body that is characteristic of a particular breed.

In spring, drakes shed their bright plumage and look like a female. In this case, the size of the individuals matters. Males are always larger than females. During the winter molt, they are again covered with beautiful feathers, which remain until the mating season. Ornithologists note distinctive features in individuals of different sexes:

Experienced hunters and ornithologists can recognize a drake and a female by their voice. Ducks most often quack abruptly. Males can hiss, whistle, crackle, and produce intricate trills. It is especially important to pay attention to the voice wild birds after the spring molt, when the drakes lose their bright feathers.

Characteristics of domestic ducks

Farmers need to know how to distinguish males from females in a duck herd. This will allow them to properly form a herd and prescribe the appropriate diet. To determine the sex of ducks of domestic breeds, the following values ​​are important: external differences between a drake and a female.

This is especially visible in the spring, during the mating season. The male duck is bright. His behavior is active. Males begin to court females. They spread their wings, attracting ducks with their bright plumage. By the behavior of birds in a flock, one can distinguish the sex of individuals.

Some ducks of domestic breeds show clear sexual dimorphism in plumage color. Gender differences are visible in photographs presented on the Internet:

• Muscovy ducks. The main differences between the breed are the growths around the eyes and at the base of the beak. In the drake they are bright red and look like large warts. In ducks, the growth is small and has a pinkish tint. The male's plumage is black and white. The head and chest are cast green. Females are uniformly variegated;
• Khaki Campbell. The plumage of the birds is light brown. The boy can be recognized by the dark feather on his head and light wings. Girls evenly Brown;
• Bashkir duck. Looking at pictures of birds, you may not immediately recognize them as domestic ducks. The bird pair is more similar to the mallard family. Individuals have identical plumage color. Getting to know them better, their distinctive features are clearly noticeable. Domestic ducks are much larger, weighing more than 4 kg.

Unfortunately, it is not always possible to determine the sex of birds by external characteristics, by the color of their feathers. There are individuals with snow-white plumage. It is difficult to recognize a female and a male in the following breeds: Agidel, Moscow White, Pekingese, Cherry Valley. How to create a duck meat and egg flock in this case? Experts resort to the Japanese technique. It allows you to determine the sex of individuals from birth. On external signs They don't pay attention. The chicks' down looks the same on most breeds of ducks.

According to the Japanese method of determining the sex of ducklings, it is proposed to inspect the cloaca of individuals and find the genitals. They are poorly developed, but anatomical differences in chicks can be detected. How to distinguish a duck from a drake by primary sexual characteristics? In the male, a protruding tubercle is clearly visible on the inner wall of the cloaca on the left. It is oblong. These are the beginnings of the penis. When examining females, no tubercles are visible.

The fallopian tube is closed by a membrane. It is a thin skin growth. An experienced specialist can determine the sex of 600 chicks with great accuracy in an hour. Inexperienced birders will need some time and skill to inspect the ducklings' cloaca. What actions do the homesteaders need to implement, how to determine the sex of chicks:

1. pick up the chick. Place it on your palm, back down;
2. perform a light massage of the lower abdomen;
3. lightly press on the stomach. The mucous membrane of the inner wall of the cloaca will appear;
4. inspect the left inner wall;
5. the male will have a 2 mm long process;
6. the female has a fallopian tube on the left. A smooth mucous wall will be found on it.

You need to act carefully. Lightly press on the abdomen, slightly pushing out the mucous membrane. Otherwise, there is a risk of the intestinal walls being squeezed out of the cloaca, which can lead to the death of the duckling. Experts advise contacting a veterinarian for help. This technique is used to determine the sex of geese, turkeys, and chickens.

Palpation of the larynx

There is another way to determine sex in birds. Anatomical differences in the structure of the larynx are noticeable between ducklings of different sexes. The duck drake has an expansion on the larynx. It has the shape of a ball. Females do not have this feature. The spherical expansion can be detected by palpation:

1. The duckling is picked up. Place the stomach on the palm;
2. with one hand they stretch his neck;
3. with the other hand they feel the expansion in the upper part of the chest;
4. the procedure is painless and safe.

Let's talk about what a male duck is called. Bird boys play important role in reproduction, fertilizing female birds. In addition, they care for and protect the offspring and the female that incubates them. Hatched ducklings can also count on the help of their father, at least in the first days after birth. Males stand out appearance, behavior and dimensions. The quantity and quality of the new duck stock depends on the choice of the manufacturer. Details in the article.

Characteristic

A boy duck is called a drake. It will not be difficult to distinguish it from a duck if you use the methods described in the article.

The male duck has important difference from the female - a spiral-shaped genital organ with a length of 1.5 to 3-4 millimeters, depending on age.

When excited, it increases in size, sometimes equaling the length of the body. This feature complicates the life of drakes, making it difficult to fly and move on water or land.

The male duck has other distinctive features:

• Bright plumage color. During the mating season, it becomes even brighter - this helps the drakes attract females for mating.
• The body of males is larger than that of females. The weight of a wild male reaches 2-4 kg, a domestic one - 5-6 kg.
• A long neck with a crest of a brighter color than the rest of the plumage.
• The head has a wide forehead, the beak is triangular in shape, and has a beard.
• Some drakes have "curls" at the tip of their tail.
• The behavior is dominant, sometimes aggressive. Males are capable of starting a fight for a female or food.

Differences between domestic and wild birds

The behavior of males changes based on their habitat - whether they live at home or live in wild places.

In nature, drakes protect nests where females hatch eggs from attacks by predators: birds, foxes, martens, and snakes. There is no such need in a home environment.

House drakes are trusting and are not afraid to approach people. Certain species of wild birds, for example, mallards, also approach humans. However, for them it sometimes ends in failure. Due to the extermination of ducks by people for fun or food, some wild species are on the verge of extinction.

The feeding habits of domestic and wild birds are not very different. However, domesticated ducks do not have to search for food around the clock - they are fed by the owner. On the other hand, they are able to feed on their own, just like wild males: crustaceans, grass, duckweed and other food found in pastures and reservoirs.

Description of wild males

The wigeon has a light body and a head with brown plumage. Males are cautious, timid, often hide in reeds and other secluded places, and fly quickly. Therefore, hunting them is difficult and challenging for hunters. More information you will find in the article.

Teal have several subspecies: cracker, whistler, kloktun, marbled and others. IN autumn period the drakes become the usual brown color, like the females. You can learn more about this variety of wild ducks in the article.

Distinctive feature male killer whale - black legs and beak. The plumage is inconspicuous, which makes them look like females.

During the mating season, the male pintail does not change the color of its plumage. It remains inconspicuous, just like in females.

From wild to domestic

The mallard is a common species of wild duck. Drakes have bright plumage with a white stripe on the neck. They are careless and naive, making them easy targets for hunters. Male and female mallards have long been kept indoors. The features of their domestication can be found in the article.

Indo-duck is also called musk duck due to the secretion of fat with a musky aroma. Drakes of this breed have heavy weight, unpretentious, rarely make sounds. Another feature of males is their strong immunity. They live long and rarely get sick.

Peking duck is often kept in private subsidiary farms. The males of this breed are similar in color to the females. They can be distinguished by their weight: drakes reach a mass of 4 kilos, while ducks weigh no more than 3.5 kilos. In addition, boys are more restless than girls, and often conflict with “competitors.” Other common domestic breeds are described in the article.

Selecting a drake for a tribe

At making the right choice breeding drake Indo-ducks, Pekingese or any other breed can be counted on to produce strong and healthy offspring.

Males play an important role in the household. Starting from fertilization of females to obtaining fresh, healthy meat and warm fluff. When choosing drakes for your tribe, be guided by the following parameters:

• The chick's body must have the correct proportions - a straight keel without curvature.
• Healthy males are active and noisy. It is not recommended to take lethargic or aggressive birds.
• It is better to choose week-old drakes - by this time they will get stronger and show character.

Do not forget about the ratio in the duck tribe: for every three females there is one drake. The distribution of food and living conditions depend directly on the number of drakes in the household.

We hope that the information presented was useful to you. We will be grateful for your like and repost. Leave comments and check out our other articles.

Kira Stoletova

Every person, even those not related to farming and poultry breeding, knows that a drake and a duck are individuals of the opposite sex, belonging to the same species. Thus, the drake is a male duck, distinguished by its rather large size in relation to the female. For example, the female of the common egg-meat breed of domestic duck reaches a maximum of 3.5 kg, while the male can grow up to 5.

Ducks are very popular among poultry farmers in our country. Few people will say that they don’t like the large eggs with large bright yolks or the tender meat of this bird. However, it is important for poultry farmers to be able to immediately recognize what sex the ducklings are, because for good egg production and selection, the ratio between females and males should be 4:1. Anyone who has been breeding birds for several years will be able to determine what gender the chick is without much effort.

Sex determination in chicks

A male bird can be identified among older chicks even from a photo - even a child can handle this. The baby drake has variegated plumage, while the female’s feathers are gray and inconspicuous. But young animals begin to look this way at about 2 months. How to distinguish a drake from a duck when they are still just chicks?

The drake chick is more active. Anyone who lives in a village knows that if you lift the baby by the legs and leave it in a head-down position for some time, the female will be calm, and the male baby will turn his head and try to pull himself up to his legs. Of course, it is impossible to know for sure what gender the bird is, but there is still a certain probability.

The method that makes it possible to determine the sex of even a two-week-old baby with the greatest accuracy is the so-called “Japanese method.” It consists in the fact that you need to take the duckling with your left hand so that the chick’s head is turned towards the person holding it, and then carefully massage the anal passage of the cub. To do this, you need to slightly pull up the edge of the cloaca. If a small pseudopenis appears, this is a male cub. The female has a membrane-covered oviduct opening located on the left side of the cloaca. On palpation there are small round compactions. In the same way, gender is determined in geese.

Pseudopenis is a distinctive feature of drakes, since most males of other poultry species, such as roosters and turkeys, do not have it. This organ looks like a small fold up to 4 mm wide. Sometimes it can be detected in a cub simply by pulling the tail towards the back. This and the Japanese methods give an almost error-free result if you act carefully and correctly.

Differences between adult males

It is not at all difficult to distinguish an adult male from a female in a duck family. In addition to the fact that the drake is distinguished by its bright plumage, it is also much larger than a duck, weighing twice as much.

Drakes also differ from females in the following ways:

• A triangular beak with a growth at the tip; the duck's beak is trapezoidal.
• Massive and irregular shape heads with expansion from the forehead, in contrast to the rounded and small heads of females.
• The muscles of the legs are more developed, just like the muscles of the back and wings, which is why their bodies are longer and larger compared to the bodies of females.
• The feathers at the tip of the tail curl upward, forming a ring in some breeds
• Drakes, unlike ducks, do not quack, but make peculiar hissing sounds and whistles. The duck, with the help of its loud voice, calls ducklings and attracts males during the mating season.
• Sustained immunity - drakes are less susceptible to the influence of pathogenic bacteria and viruses, remain strong and healthy longer
• Aggressive behavior. Males They often try to fly away or escape from their master’s house and fight for leadership.

Color of male ducks during mating season

Drakes are distinguished by their bright colors, which reach their peak intensity in winter and spring period- when ducks form pairs. For example, the male mallard, the ancestor of the domestic duck, has a remarkable dark green head color with iridescence, ending on the neck with a thin ring stripe. The back and wings are gray with brown markings, black rump, blue or purple mirror in the upper part of the wings. After molting, the drake differs from the gray duck only in its brown breast and yellow beak. It is better not to leave males in the same territory with laying hens also because the duck is a very timid mother, especially when the ducklings have just hatched and every chick counts for her.

Male Muscovy duck most often dark in color with light inserts, but there are also completely white individuals. Distinctive feature The drakes of this breed are corals - abundant red growths on the head.

The mandarin duck, a small forest bird, has a distinctive crest on its head, a contrasting golden-brown back, and wings striped with white and purple.

Behavior of drakes during mating period

During the mating season, ducks and drakes of ordinary breeds behave equally actively. The ratio of ducks to drakes is 4 to 1, especially in the Muscovy breed. Ducks mature sexually earlier, so the male should be 1-1.5 months older. For breeding purposes, it is recommended to use drakes for 3 breeding cycles, after which the birds are no longer so good for procreation.

Under no circumstances should you force the molting process in males! The drake may lose potency and will not trample ducks and fertilize eggs. As a result, it will not leave offspring - and how much effort of the breeders will be wasted! To avoid such an unpleasant situation after egg laying, it is better to transplant it to recently moulted ducks.

Gr. FORESTRY - DRAKE

The drake is handsome!

Often, male musk ducks are used to breed so-called mulards. To do this, it is necessary that the female and male match each other in color. That is, if a musky male is gray, then the female of the usual breed selected for him should also be gray. But it is worth considering that musk drakes They are very indifferent to fulfilling their “marital duty,” especially with females of other breeds, so most of the eggs may be unfertilized. For one such drake there are no more than 4 ducks.

In many breeds, the differences between a duck and a drake are not obvious. If you don’t know what signs to look for, it is impossible in most cases to separate males from females; it is especially difficult to determine the sex of ducklings. However, there are character traits appearance and character that allow you to distinguish a duck from a drake. Once you have learned to reliably determine the sex of ducks, in the future you can always do this without much difficulty.

It is very important to be able to determine the sex of a bird, since it is necessary to correctly select the ratio of drakes and ducks in the population. Ideal quantities of the first and second when grown for meat and for obtaining large quantity eggs for the purpose of producing offspring are different, but in both cases, the correct selection of proportions will help increase productivity to the maximum.

The plumage of the drake is brighter than that of ducks

The photo shows a male and female Muscovy duck

Wild duck drakes have bright plumage.

Characteristic external differences drakes:

• brighter plumage than females;
• larger sizes;
• the wide forehead has the shape of a triangle;
• a tuft of feathers on the neck;
• large beak;
• feather beard.

Despite the fact that drakes are characterized by larger sizes, when kept at home this rule is not always followed. Sometimes the male may be smaller than the female; this largely depends on the conditions of detention and diet. The drake's forehead expands sharply upward from the beak, while in females its outline is smoother, and its shape is closer to a trapezium.

Reference. A portable device that generates ultrasound can help quickly determine the sex of ducks. Experimentally, you can select a frequency on it that will be unpleasant for individuals of a certain sex. In this case, when you turn on the device, they will move to the side.

Another way to determine the sex of a duck is to observe its behavior. The drakes let the females go ahead, staying behind and slightly to the side.

They also usually stand out for their noisiness and pugnacity. This behavior is especially characteristic of the dominant male in the herd, who always strives to emphasize his dominant position.

At the same time, he will direct his aggression towards other males. Ducks, unlike drakes, do not strive for conflicts; they have a calm character and try to fly away much less often.

However, it is not always possible to correctly determine gender based on these features. If the herd has an incorrect ratio of drakes to ducks - and the ideal proportion is 1:4 - females may behave like males, and vice versa. Behavioral features, like appearance traits by which gender can be determined, appear only in the second or third month of life.

Determining by sexual characteristics is the most accurate way to find out whether you are looking at a drake or a duck. In this way, you can even find out the sex of one-day-old chicks. You need to take the bird and put it on its back, and then with the other hand carefully grasp the skin from the cloaca towards the abdomen.

The male will have a small rudimentary penis, or pseudopenis, and the female will have two round spherical growths. Despite the apparent simplicity of this method, it is quite difficult to master, but after gaining some experience, every poultry farmer can cope with this task.

The difference between a male and his voice

Gender can also be determined by voice. Females are much noisier, they quack sharply and loudly. While for males a quiet hissing hiss is more typical. With this simple way You can fairly reliably distinguish a drake from a duck, but you shouldn’t rely on it alone.

Important. To definitely avoid confusion when determining gender, you should always focus on several methods.

Since differences in appearance and behavior become clearly visible only in the third month of life, determining the sex of ducklings is especially challenging. difficult task. It is best to use the method described above, which involves examining the genitals.

The accuracy of this method is about 99%, but it requires some experience to use it. Beginner poultry farmers often find it difficult to cope with this task. Once you know the sex of the ducklings, for your own convenience, you can attach tags to them so that in the future you will always know whether it is a male or a female.

Many breeds have their own characteristic features that can be used to distinguish a drake from a duck:

It is often very difficult to determine the sex of a duck based on one or two of the above characteristics. In the case of domestic ducks, due to housing and feeding conditions, females often acquire certain traits of males, and vice versa. Therefore, it is not surprising that even farmers who have been keeping ducks for several years are sometimes confused about this issue.

As a result, the ratio of birds of one sex to another in their flock is far from ideal, resulting in a drop in productivity, and some poultry farmers are trying to produce offspring in a situation where in fact there are only males or only females in their flock. To avoid such mistakes, it is necessary to determine gender not by one, but by several characteristics.

In the video, a farmer shares simple and effective way How to distinguish a drake from a duck.

After the problem is solved, a special mark can be attached to the duck, which will avoid confusion in the future. With a careful and responsible approach to business, you will always know how many ducks and drakes are among your livestock, and this will allow you to get maximum amount meat and eggs.