Bachelor Ducks Run Amok

[CayugaJana]

What about clipping the wings really short on your serial offenders? That was others have a better chance of getting away.

I have a female named Spike and she was ruthless until something tried to grab her through our fence and snapped her arm. Now she doesn’t have full use of her arm and I clipped her wing really short. But that was out of necessity since she couldn’t hold it up. But now she doesn’t pick on anyone so I guess that is a positive out of the situation.

 

[Booodog]

Update: it's now mid November, and as several folks predicted, they are all buddies again.

Had them in two separate groups for awhile. When the two little call ducks we're let out, all they wanted to do was go taunt the others through the wire.

One day, about two weeks ago, I was doing some work on their pen, and they all got out at the same time. That had been really bad in the past, but this time they just pushed and shoved a bit, so I stood back and watched.

After a few more supervised playtimes, I put them all back together. No problems! We'll see what we get in the spring.

 

[CrystaBub]

 

[thumper650]

Update: it's now mid November, and as several folks predicted, they are all buddies again.

Had them in two separate groups for awhile. When the two little call ducks we're let out, all they wanted to do was go taunt the others through the wire.

One day, about two weeks ago, I was doing some work on their pen, and they all got out at the same time. That had been really bad in the past, but this time they just pushed and shoved a bit, so I stood back and watched.

After a few more supervised playtimes, I put them all back together. No problems! We'll see what we get in the spring.

That's great news. My four are doing well, only a little aggression over food. One of my pekins (Roscoe) goes after my black runner (Bill). What's funny is now my fawn and white runner (Brendan) gets between them and seems to break up their fights!

 

[Booodog]

That's great news. My four are doing well, only a little aggression over food. One of my pekins (Roscoe) goes after my black runner (Bill). What's funny is now my fawn and white runner (Brendan) gets between them and seems to break up their fights!

I've seen my runners doing this, too now. Before, they were just bumps on a log. First I was surprised by how unique each personality was. Now I see that they change over time, too.

 

[Booodog]

Update: unseasonably warm here, and the duck hut is a battlefield.

After working through a bunch of scenarios, I can pretty much confirm that mixing breeds is the whole problem here.

It's NEVER directed at the same breed.

 

[Miss Lydia]

Any idea what your going to do?

 

[Booodog]

Any idea what your going to do?

I'm not sure. The largest duck, who was seriously aggressive, died a few months ago. At this point, nobody's getting hurt. It's just like a bunch of kids squabbling in the backseat the whole way to Disneyworld.

Which, to be perfectly heartless, is not what I had in mind, not for months on end.

I could try to re-home either the call ducks or the runners, but I'm not sure I can choose. When I think I've figured it out, I get sad about losing the other one.

I think I'll try splitting them up first and seeing how I feel about that. I did some of that last year, though, and it wasn't as simple as it seemed.

When I'd let one group out, all they wanted to do was go antagonize the others through the wire.

Might be different now that the Jumbo Pekin is gone. That dude had some dark energy.

 

[Miss Lydia]

All you can do is try. @thumper650 makes it work so maybe now that there’s just 2 groups.

 

[thumper650]

I think the problem is not the breed of duck, but too many drakes. Having thr aggressive drake gone should help. Please give it a try.