According to Eric Lewis in his Background to British Magic History column in The Linking Ring, Vol. 69 No. 8, Aug. 1989, p. 44, the first version of this prop was in the form of a swan, manufactured by Professor W. Norris, an English conjurer and dealer, sometime between 1868-1885. Laurie Ireland's marketed “Otto The Automaton Duck,” 1936, came much later.