Drake killed.....and ate his fellow duck??

[Indianrunner123]

Hey!

So bit of a strange one. My brother keeps little call ducks and drakes, he has this one drake who killed all his children by drowning them once, drowned his partner and now.....................I discovered last night he had killed a fellow call duck....and...em...ate her? Like yesterday they were fine, it was this drake and two ducks in a run, and this morning this one duck is dead as a doornail, nothing left of her and picked to a complete bone. It is a totall.y secure pen so nothing could have gotten in or out, I definitely think the drake did this.

Anyone ever experienced this before????

Below the drake in question on the right and his first partner who he also killed (og which he also drowned their 6 ducklings)

 

[sourland]

He possibly may have killed the other drake, but there is no way he ate an entire bird. There's a predator involved.

 

[Miss Lydia]

I agree with @sourland, you need to check every square inch of the pen and coop they are in.

 

[NatJ]

yesterday they were fine, it was this drake and two ducks in a run, and this morning this one duck is dead as a doornail, nothing left of her and picked to a complete bone. It is a totall.y secure pen so nothing could have gotten in or out, I definitely think the drake did this.

It should not be possible for one drake and the remaining duck to eat all of the other duck in a single night-- just a consideration of body size here, and how much food they can manage at a time.

So I think something else must have helped with the eating, no matter who or what did the killing.

 

[JacinLarkwell]

I'm thinking mice or rats at the very least. They can completely disappear chicks, so a handful (cause there's never just one) could probably do a decent amount of damage if there's an opportunity

 

[Canadian Wind]

I would also seriously consider rehoming this drake, or separating him from any other duck.

 

[BelovedBirds]

Hey!

So bit of a strange one. My brother keeps little call ducks and drakes, he has this one drake who killed all his children by drowning them once, drowned his partner and now.....................I discovered last night he had killed a fellow call duck....and...em...ate her? Like yesterday they were fine, it was this drake and two ducks in a run, and this morning this one duck is dead as a doornail, nothing left of her and picked to a complete bone. It is a totall.y secure pen so nothing could have gotten in or out, I definitely think the drake did this.

Anyone ever experienced this before????

Below the drake in question on the right and his first partner who he also killed (og which he also drowned their 6 ducklings) View attachment 3485050

I agree with the others, regardless of what killed him, he wasn't eaten fully by just the ducks.
A predator was involved
Hungry rats could take a duck that size down very easily, and those guys are super hard to keep out of duck pens etc. They'll dig tunnels underground, they can get through chicken wire if the gaps are big enough.


Him having drowned ducklings isnt really surprising, having a drake with young babies is super risky. If the mother isnt willing to, or able to, protect them, he could kill them. That's a risk with any drake. That said, he has killed an adult duck before, so for that alone I wouldn't personally want him around my hens anymore.

 

[janiedoe]

Can you post some pictures of your pen?