Adult Muscovy Male Raising Two Juvenile Muscovy Males?

[Daninflorida2024]

Recently, I came across what seemed to be an Adult Male Muscovy raising two Juvenile Male Muscovies, and this struck me because everything I’ve read has said that the Adult Male had little or nothing to do with raising the young, and that the mother alone raised the ducks from birth onward. I am attaching a couple clips of what I saw, and it absolutely most definitely seemed like the adult male Muskovy was leading the two juvenile male Muskovy‘s, and also explicitly seemed like he would stop and make a noise and look towards them, and they would come running to him almost on command, and also in another clip, he leads them up to a bush and almost seems to talk to them and provide instruction about which part of the bush is safe to eat, he does this as he lifts his head and opens his mouth pointing up at the bush, and then looking at them and then pointing back at the bush. Yes, it sounds crazy, but was very cool to watch and I came away with a clear sense that this adult male was raising the juvenile males! Has anyone seen this behavior before? Do dads teach the young juvenile males on some level? Please take a look at the videos I posted and let me know your thoughts. Maybe I’m seeing things the wrong way, or maybe I’ve found the rare Dad who is raising his juvenile son ducks! But please watch the clips and help me understand! Thanks, Daniel Young

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[ruthhope]

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It maybe that most muscovy drakes are not involved in raising the ducklings, but I see muscovy drakes with females and ducklings frequently. We have very many feral muscovy in NE Florida and I see them daily. I am heartened when I see a drake hanging around protective of their mate and ducklings as the retention ponds are crowded and the drake needs to be there to protect the ducklings from other drakes.

I haven't seen an adult drake with ducklings but no female looking after the ducklings. I imagine that something happened to the female and the drake took over. I have seen a group of drake, mama muscovy and two adolescent muscovy this year. Sadly, the mama muscovy was killed on the road and all three hung around -- the mama's corpse had to be moved well away from the road so that the other three could stay with it and not be in danger from the road. I went to check up on them a couple of hours later and the two juveniles had stayed and remained until twilight -- with the drake sitting further away but staying with the juveniles in his sight. At dusk they all three left for their roost. I was very sad. It was on my local hospital campus, and the traffic should not be going more than 25mph. But drivers are careless and there are too many such accidents

 

[Worschtee1]

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That's the most adorable thing I think I've ever seen! Go Dad!!