Domestic Duck Breeds

From heavy duck breeds like the Aylesbury or Rouen to the ‘bowling pin’ Indian Runner or the tiny but noisy little Call duck, there’s usually a breed of duck that will tickle your fancy!

Duck breeds are grouped into Heavy, Medium and Light weight classes in the standards. Commercially, ducks are bred for their meat, foie gras and eggs and this is why we have many of the breeds we have today.

Remember not all white ducks are Aylesbury’s though, just as not every white goose is an Embden! Commercially, there are many crosses that have been created along the way and there are many white ducks that seem to pick up the Aylesbury name.

For the specialist breeders and keepers of pure breeds of ducks, they are charming pets, and produce reasonable numbers of eggs.

Picture Above: A Crested duck, one of the more unusual breeds of duck.

Duck Breeds Selector: UK Standardised Breeds

Click on the link under the picture to go to the breed page.

Abacot Ranger (Male) Light Duck	Aylesbury (Male) Heavy Duck	Bali (Male) Light Duck
Black East Indian (Female) Bantam Duck	Blue Swedish (Female) Duck	Call (Female) Bantam Duck
Campbell Khaki (Male) Light Duck	Cayuga (Male) Heavy Duck	Crested (Male) Light Duck
Crested Miniature (Female) Bantam Duck	Hook Bill Dusky Bibbed (Male) Light Duck	Indian Runner White (Male) Runner Duck
Magpie Black and White (Female) Light Duck	Muscovy Black Magpie (Female) Heavy Duck	Orpington Buff (Male) Light Duck
Pekin (Female) Heavy Duck	Rouen (Male) Heavy Duck	Rouen Clair (Female) Heavy Duck
Saxony (Male) Heavy Duck	Silver Appleyard (Female) Heavy Duck	Silver Appleyard Miniature (Male) Bantam Duck
Silver Bantam (Male) Bantam Duck	Welsh Harlequin (Female) Light Duck

We have taken many pictures of ducks at poultry and waterfowl shows but if you have a photograph of a good example of a domestic breed in a natural setting, we would certainly be interested in hearing from you.

I get many requests from people to identify a breed of duck they have seen on their local pond. Sadly, these ducks have usually been dumped there and are often crosses with other wild or domestic ducks visiting the pond. Please note, you should never release domestic ducks into the wild as Zoe explains in this article.

Breeds of Domestic Ducks are classified in the UK by the British Waterfowl Standards published by the British Waterfowl Association. They align with the Poultry Club of Great Britain Standards that are produced.  There are other breeds of domestic duck standardised in other countries. The following organisations maintain these standards for domestic ducks:

• the American Poultry Association in the United States.
• the Entente Européenne d’Aviculture et de Cuniculture in Europe.
• the Australian Poultry Standards in Australia.

Images are Copyright 
Please do not use these images without permission.

Duck Breeds Pictures Thanks… We have to give an extra special thank you to Rupert Stephenson, poultry photographer who has supplied us with so many first class duck breeds pictures for this area of the site and the British Waterfowl Association and Poultry Club of Great Britain members for their support in allowing us to photograph their ducks at various shows over the years.