Comparison of Duck Breeds

Use this table of duck breeds to compare all the different types of ducks for sale at Ziwani Poultry. This data comes from our experience on the farm, feedback from customers, and information gathered from researchers. Depending if you want a duck specifically for egg or meat production, foraging, show, a pet, or one of the many other reasons people raise ducks, this will help you find the best duck breed for you.

Today most domesticated types of ducks originate from the wild Mallard and a few from the Muscovy. Ducks were domesticated in Asia, but now there are many different duck breeds developed for all different climates and applications.

Due to 5 of our domesticated ducks originating from the mallard, any one of the breeds we sell can produce fertile progeny if they cross with any other breed apart from crossing with Muscovy duck. Ducks will fully integrate with all the other breeds we offer. Therefore, if you want purebred ducklings hatching from your ducks, you need to keep the breeds separate during the breeding season. Or you can let them cross and see what different shapes and colours you will get in their ducklings. What will you get if you cross a Mallard with a Pekin, or a Swedish Black/Blue with a Khaki Campbell, or a Khaki Campbell with a Pekin?

 

Cross Breeds of Muscovy with other duck breeds

Muscovy and domestic ducks (such as the Pekin – which were developed from Mallards) are very different; Whereas a Pekin takes 28 days to hatch and a Muscovy takes 35 days, a mule or hinny takes 32 days to hatch.

They can be crossed but you get some very interesting results. If you cross a Muscovy male with a Pekin female you will hatch moulards (or mule ducks); if you cross a Pekin male with a Muscovy female the progeny are called hinnies.

Mules and hinnies cannot reproduce. Both males are sterile and only the hinny females lay eggs (though they cannot hatch). If you have Muscovy and Pekin together, the chances are poor that they will cross but if they do, a hinny will probably be the result as Pekin males can catch Muscovy females easier than Muscovy males can catch Pekin females.

Breed	Temperament	Weight	Egg Prod. /yr	Mothering	Egg Size	Foraging Ability	Flying Ability
Black Swedish	Calm	5 – 6.25	120 – 180	Fair	80 – 95 grams	Good	None
Blue Swedish	Calm	5 – 6.25	120 – 180	Fair	80 – 90 grams	Good	None
Khaki Campbell	Nervous	3.5 – 4.5	165 – 210	Good	75 – 85 grams	Very Good	Maybe
Mallard	Calm	2.25 – 2.5	60 -120	Very Good	65 – 75 grams	Very Good	Very Good
Pekin	Calm	7 – 13.5	140 – 220	Poor	90 – 100 grams	Fair	None
Muscovy	Calm	2.5 – 6	60 – 150	Very Good	90 – 100 grams	Very Good	Very Good

 

A permit is not needed to own or sell ducklings from Kenya wildlife Service (KWS).