Runner ducks are all the rage - but they aren't the ideal garden duck

Chris Ashton looks into their needs and natural behaviour

A bowling pin on legs – or even a soda water bottle. That’s the way Indian Runners have been described in the past. These upright birds are built for ranging and foraging in the paddy fields of Southeast Asia (not India). They certainly aren't built for living in a confined area or 'run'. If space is limited, then please don't hatch or buy them; get something more suited to a small space, such as Call ducks. Runners are great for a farm or large garden (as long as it's fox-free) for slug foraging and egg-production, but they are not at home in the confined space of a chickensized run.

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Runners seem to have a certain cachet at the moment. There is more awareness of the pure, standardized Runner colours such as the glossy Blacks, and strikingly marked Fawn-&-whites. However, many hatching eggs sold as pure Runners are actually from mixed flocks because it's simply easier and cheaper to look after them in just one group instead of individually penned pedigree pairs.

Runners are much easier to hatch than tiny Call ducks and other pure breeds (such as Buff Orpingtons and Cayugas) because the mixing up the Runner colours creates genetic diversity which increases hatchability even for the novice. A good Brinsea incubator, used according to the instructions, can produce very respectable results from such hatching eggs, even when very little is known by the operator about the development of the egg during the incubation process.