Drakes fighting

[Sue S]

Hi Everybody, it's been a while since I've been on BYC, hope everyone is doing well. 3 of my 1 year old drakes are consistently fighting each other, ( yes, it's spring & mating season) so I realized they would not be very friendly with each other but they are ripping each other's feathers out, no injuries except they are bald on the top of their heads & neck. They are beginning to look like " junk yard ducks"!!!! I've given them Nurti-Drench but is there anything else I can give them to possible help their feathers start to grow back. I'm afraid by the time the fighting stops & they figure out who the dominate drake is, that I will have featherless ducks!!!!!

 

[sourland]

Do you have an all drake flock, or do you also have ducks. Testosterone driven drakes can go nuts to the point of killing one another. The only surefire cure is separation until later in the season.

 

[Miss Lydia]

Sound advise from @sourland drakes have been known to kill one another it happened here when I first started. Best to just separate or get down to just a few or one drake.

 

[Sue S]

Do you have an all drake flock, or do you also have ducks. Testosterone driven drakes can go nuts to the point of killing one another. The only surefire cure is separation until later in the season.

No, I also have females. I'm hoping that they get out of the fighting stage soon, the weather is starting to warm up here so they have been out free ranging more so I'm hoping that will help the situation, if it doesn't I will definitely separate them before they injure or kill each other.

 

[Malainee]

It's winter for me and our two 9 month old Rouen drakes have been going at it for close to 2 weeks not if not longer (I've lost count of how long it's been).

One drake "Green Beak" seems to be the dominant male, and the subordinate, "Yellow Beak", I guess doesn't know when to quit?

Is fighting in the winter normal? Do we need to cull one? It's only been feather loss until today, I'm pretty sure I saw some blood on Yellow Beak's shoulder.

We also have 6 ducks (2 Rouens and 4 Welsh Harlequins (though one might be a cross)). We got them for eggs and to raise and butcher their offspring, so we are expecting to butcher ducks eventually, but I didn't emotionally prepare myself to have to do that with our starting stock.

 

[Miss Lydia]

If you don’t want to butcher separate them. I can’t have but one Muscovy drake because of fighting. It’s about the only way to prevent it. Split the females up between them.

 

[Malainee]

If you don’t want to butcher separate them. I can’t have but one Muscovy drake because of fighting. It’s about the only way to prevent it. Split the females up between them.

They are free range so we don't really have a way to separate them. I guess we'll be having roast duck later this week. Best get used to it now I suppose.

Thank you for your insight.