Bullying Drakes..

[Jessica89]

Hello,

I added two sweet, female Magpie ducks to the flock two days ago... They are soo sweet, timid and wont leave each others sides.

I already had two female ducks and two drakes,

The female ducks are fine with the new additions but the drakes are really nasty. They arn't mating with them.. They are chasing them and grabbing their feathers. Then they stay away from the rest. It's really upsetting.

Does anyone know why they are doing this and what can I do to stop it? I've had to seperate them for now.

-Jessica

 

[silkiecuddles]

I used to have a mallard pair. Whenever the female hatched ducklings, the male was really nasty to them. We lost many ducklings cause of him.
I now have 2 female and 2 male Pekins, all fully grown. I recently hatched 11 Pekin ducklings, and the males are being nasty to them.
That just goes to show that it isn't just your males that are mean.

Maybe you could put the newbies in a pen where the males can see them, but not hurt them? Or get rid of one and see if that helps. That's what we'll be doing with the mean Pekins.

 

[Jessica89]

Thank you for your suggestion.. I will give that a try.

I was surprised the males are acting like this. I thought they would try and mate but not attack them. The meanies.