Aggressive drake isolating another drake. Which should I rehome?

[gentryfarm5]

We have 7 Rouen ducks. 5 are drakes, 2 females. I know this is a terrible ratio, but we raised them from a 3 day old straight run. They have lived perfectly together until this week (23 weeks old) when they started wanting to mate. Now the dominate drake has decided to pick on one of the others and has isolated him from the flock. Every time he comes anywhere near the rest of them, the dominate drake chases him off pecking aggressively at his tail. If any of the others try to join the isolated one, the dominate chases them back in and the other farther away. It is so sad! The one being picked on ends up alone all day and then when they come up to their pen at night he hangs back until the others are in and runs in as fast as he can into one of the crates where I lock him in to protect him from the one attacking him. I've read a lot of the posts on this forum and come to the conclusion that we need to rehome at least 3 of our drakes and maybe add some more hens, but should I rehome the dominate aggressive one or the one being picked on? Thanks!

 

[Pyxis]

Unfortunately, you really need to rehome four drakes, or get at least enough females that you'll have three or four each for the rest of the drakes that you keep. The correct ratio is at least three to four ducks to drakes. As for which to rehome, that's your choice. I'd probably rehome the aggressive one myself. I had a drake once who was aggressive towards all my other drakes but one, and he eventually contributed to the death of one of them. You can't be sure that he won't decide to switch his aggression to another one if you rehome the picked on one. Then again, your ratio is so off that it might be contributing greatly to the aggression, and if you fix the ratio he might be more well behaved.