Grey Mallard & Trout Indian Runner Duck
Grey Mallard Indian Runners is a rare and beautiful color. Indian Runners stand erect like penguins and, rather than waddling, they run. Runner ducks are prolific layers and good strains will lay in excess of 250 eggs a year. They are active foragers, seeking out snails, slugs, insects, and other goodies. They are happier spending most of their time foraging for food than being on water. Indian Runners are hardy birds with a timid nature but trainable as companions. They do well with being socialized after hatching but will still be easily excitable and will panic if cornered. The Grey Runner has traditional Mallard coloring, a rare and beautiful color. The drakes have green heads and grey and brown bodies, the hens have all brown bodies.
Greenlands Farm is a member of the National Poultry Improvement Plan (NPIP).
Our NPIP status is U.S. Pollorum-Typhoid Clean, AI Clean, and Salmonella Monitored.
HATCHING EGGS
We will have a limited amount we will pre-sell Spring 2026. Please understand it is a waitlist and the shipping date can not be guaranteed until the breeding season has started and we have checked fertility. There are NO REFUNDS.
Ordering Limit
Important: Please only select one listing per breed. If you would like more than what we have listed, please contact us to see if we are able to fulfill. We are a hobby farm and generally don’t have large flocks, but sometimes our layers produce more during certain seasons.
Your payment secures your spot in our shipping schedule. We fulfill orders in the order we receive them. Please understand there may be a wait list. Shipping choices are at checkout.
We are constantly working on the quality of our flocks. We have some Trout genes along with our Greys. The Trout colouration is caused by the light phased gene (li/li) turning the usually dark phase (L/L) Mallard/Grey (M/M L/L) into Trouts which are light phase mallard (M/M li/li). We’ve decided to keep with breeding both and continue to work on correct bill color. You may get some dark bills in hens. We also are working on chest size for both sexes.
We have a limited amount we are pre-selling for 2025 breeding season. Please understand it is a waitlist and the shipping date can not be guaranteed. There are NO REFUNDS.
We are a small hobby farm and do not have 100’s of birds of each breed, therefore, we have a limited amount we presell and then release more shipping dates as availability arises. Please carefully select your shipping date as WE DO NOT OFFER REFUNDS. Your shipping date is not guaranteed but we do leave a week open every several weeks to reschedule should we have setbacks with things out of our control (weather, egg production, family emergencies, etc.). Our Spring shipments start when we have checked our fertility rates - which we are very particular about. If our rates aren’t good, we don’t ship until they are. So, our first release of dates are limited each year until we confirm and then we add dates throughout the breeding season - so check back or follow our facebook @greenlandsfarm.animals for updates.
You can not place two orders of the same listing but you are welcome to choose another listing of another quantity.
Your payment secures your spot in our shipping schedule. We normally only ship on Mondays and Tuesdays (depending on the destination, sometimes we ship Express on Wednesday or Thursday). We fulfill orders in the order we receive them.We highly suggest USPS EXPRESS or UPS 2nd Day Air because you get a guaranteeddelivery date and the mail has been running unpredictability. Local Pickup, please select “Local Pick Up” for shipping during checkout.
We have hatching eggs available from around April - October (depending on when breeding season starts and ends). Quantities vary on the season and flock size. You are welcome to contact us off season to see what we have available. We require payment in full before pick-up and shipment. We can not guarantee a successful home hatching but we do have a 80% - 95% hatch rate on our farm. Please read our policy thoroughly at checkout before purchasing.
We are continuously working on the quality of our breeders. We are currently working on correct bill color for the hens and chest size in both sexes. We have decided to keep the light phase (Trout) in our lines. We added new bloodlines in 2023 and have noticed some of the ducklings are solid at hatching. We are growing out on to see what these new bloodlines introduced to our flock. If you don’t find this acceptable, we suggest you not order from us. It’s very hard to find new bloodlines and sometimes it introduces surprises.
We have a limited amount we are pre-selling for 2025 breeding season. Please understand it is a waitlist and the shipping date can not be guaranteed. There are NO REFUNDS.
We are a small hobby farm and do not have 100’s of birds of each breed, therefore, we have a limited amount we presell and then release more shipping dates as availability arises. Please carefully select your shipping date as WE DO NOT OFFER REFUNDS. Your shipping date is not guaranteed but we do leave a week open every several weeks to reschedule should we have setbacks with things out of our control (weather, egg production, family emergencies, etc.). Our Spring shipments start when we have checked our fertility rates - which we are very particular about. If our rates aren’t good, we don’t ship until they are. So, our first release of dates are limited each year until we confirm and then we add dates throughout the breeding season - so check back or follow our facebook @greenlandsfarm.animals for updates.
You can not place two orders of the same listing but you are welcome to choose another listing of another quantity.
Your payment secures your spot in our shipping schedule. We normally only ship on Mondays and Tuesdays (depending on the destination, sometimes we ship Express on Wednesday or Thursday). We fulfill orders in the order we receive them.We highly suggest USPS EXPRESS or UPS 2nd Day Air because you get a guaranteeddelivery date and the mail has been running unpredictability. Local Pickup, please select “Local Pick Up” for shipping during checkout.
We have hatching eggs available from around April - October. Quantities vary on the season and flock size. You are welcome to contact us off season to see what we have available. We require payment in full before pick-up and shipment. We can not guarantee a successful home hatching but we do have a 80% - 95% hatch rate on our farm. Please read our policy thoroughly at checkout before purchasing.
We are continuously working on the quality of our breeders. We are currently working on correct bill color for the hens and chest size in both sexes. We have decided to keep the light phase (Trout) in our lines. We added new bloodlines in 2023 and have noticed some of the ducklings are solid at hatching. We are growing out on to see what these new bloodlines introduced to our flock. If you don’t find this acceptable, we suggest you not order from us. It’s very hard to find new bloodlines and sometimes it introduces surprises.
LIVE BIRDS
(shipping not available)
We will be hatching in the Spring of 2025. If you’d like to place an order to get on our waitlist, please contact us and we will send you a custom listing.
We have ducklings available from April - August, please contact us for quantities before purchasing. We require payment in full before pick-up. Minimum of 4 ducklings per order.
FIRST HATCH OF 2025 should be ready for pickup April 25. Ducklings go up $2 each a week starting on April 28.
Grey Mallard Indian Runner Duck Information
WE DO NOT SHIP LIVE BIRDS, pick up only. You are welcome to schedule a transport service.
This listing is for our show breeder quality (SBQ) birds, meaning although they are not show birds themselves, these birds have the genetics and characteristics which should allow them to produce show quality offspring.
We may not have hens available, please contact us for quantities before purchasing. We require payment in full before pick-up.
Grey Mallard Indian Runner Duck Information
WE DO NOT SHIP LIVE BIRDS, pick up only. You are welcome to schedule a transport service.
This listing is for our show breeder quality (SBQ) birds, meaning although they are not show birds themselves, these birds have the genetics and characteristics which should allow them to produce show quality offspring.
We have drakes available year around, please contact us for quantities before purchasing. We require payment in full before pick-up.
Grey Mallard Indian Runner Duck Information
WE DO NOT SHIP LIVE BIRDS, pick up only. You are welcome to schedule a transport service.
This listing is for our utility breeder quality (UBQ) birds, meaning they have good genetics but may possess qualities better suited for ordinary use.
We have drakes available year around, please contact us for quantities before purchasing. We require payment in full before pick-up.
Grey Mallard Indian Runner Duck Information
WE DO NOT SHIP LIVE BIRDS, pick up only. You are welcome to schedule a transport service.
History
The Indian Runner ducks are domesticated waterfowl that live in the archipelago of the East Indies. There is no evidence that they came originally from India itself. Attempts by British breeders at the beginning of the twentieth century to find examples in the subcontinent had very limited success. Like many other breeds of waterfowl imported into Europe and America, the term 'Indian' may well be fanciful, denoting a loading port or the transport by 'India-men' sailing ships of the East India Company. Other misnamed geese and ducks include the African goose, the black East Indian duck and the Muscovy duck.
The Runner became popular in Europe and America as an egg-laying variety towards the end of the nineteenth century largely as a result of an undated pamphlet called The India Runner: its History and Description published by John Donald of Wigton between 1885 and 1890. Donald's publication is advertised briefly in The Feathered World, 1895, under the title of "The Indian Runner Duck". Donald describes the pied variety and gives the popular story of the importation into Cumbria (Northwest England) by a sea captain some fifty years earlier.
The breed is unusual not only for its high egg production but also for its upright stance and variety of color genes, some of which are seen in seventeenth century Dutch paintings. Other references to such domestic ducks use the names 'Penguin Ducks' and 'Baly Soldiers'. Harrison Weir's Our Poultry (1902) describes the Penguin Ducks belonging to Mr Edward Cross in the Surrey Zoological Gardens between 1837–38. These may well have been imported by the 13th Earl of Derby. Darwin describes them (1868) as having elongated 'femur and meta-tarsi', contrary to Tegetmeier's assertions.
The Cumbrian importations, according to Matthew Smith in 1923, included completely fawn Runners and completely white Runners as well as the pied (fawn-and-white and grey-and-white) varieties. The most successful attempt to import fresh blood lines was by Joseph Walton between 1908 and 1909. Accounts of these ventures can be found in Coutts (1927) and Ashton (2002). Walton shipped in birds from Lombok and Java, revolutionizing the breeding stock which, according to Donald, had become badly mixed with local birds. Further importations by Miss Chisholm and Miss Davidson in 1924 and 1926 continued to revive the breed.
