Rubber Ducky

A Rubber Ducky or more technically, a rubber whip, is a kind of helical whip antenna usually included and used for Handheld Transceivers, the name "Rubber Ducky" refers to the antennas flexibility, electrically they are base loaded monopole whip antennas.

Rubber duckies were apparently first introduced in the 1960s and are most commonly used for HTs and portable scanners thank to their compactness and safety compared to other antennas such as telescopic whips, a rumor links the name "Rubber ducky" with JFKs daugher, caroline kennedy, who, in the 1960s, pointed at one on a US Secret Service agents HT and called it a "Rubber Ducky".

Rubber Duckies are compromise antennas, the shape and length is chosen for portability, not for electromagnetic performance, thus a more efficient antenna design is always reccomended if it's possible to set up.