Ducks have a fundamental need for water access beyond drinking, with immersion behavior being a highly motivated welfare requirement that intensive duck farming systems frequently deny.
Duck water access welfare is one of the clearest examples in aquatic bird farming of a species-specific behavioral need that is systematically denied in conventional intensive production. The motivation for water immersion is not a preference but a biological necessity - feather maintenance, ocular health, and nasal hygiene all require adequate water access. Ducks denied immersion access have measurably compromised welfare across multiple objective indicators. The good news is that providing open water access to farmed ducks is achievable with relatively modest infrastructure investment, and consumer demand for higher welfare duck products is growing. Certification schemes that require open water access provide the market signal that incentivizes producer adoption.