Help me ID the killer

[mosseater]

I vote fox or bobcat too, but I'm not convinced the second duck had a broken neck. Please convince us. A dead bird will have a floppy neck regardless of cause of death. I also agree with @cmom, the only way to be certain is to install cameras. I'm sorry for your losses.

It was all stiff with rigormortis but bent at 90 degrees at one point only on the neck, where it felt like there was no bone connection.It also made a weird clicking sound. I kill chickens with the neck dislocation method so I'm familiar with the feeling of a broken neck. I could be convinced that it scrambled in terror and somehow caught its neck and broke it. Ducks are pretty panicky and bad at finding their way.

Do you think it could have just had a heart attack or something? Died of shock during the attack?

 

[hayley3]

It was all stiff with rigormortis but bent at 90 degrees at one point only on the neck, where it felt like there was no bone connection.It also made a weird clicking sound. I kill chickens with the neck dislocation method so I'm familiar with the feeling of a broken neck. I could be convinced that it scrambled in terror and somehow caught its neck and broke it. Ducks are pretty panicky and bad at finding their way.

Do you think it could have just had a heart attack or something? Died of shock during the attack?

I had a fox grab my duck...I chased after, fox dropped the duck...duck must've died on jaw impact. No blood, no marks whatsoever.

 

[Lacy Duckwing]

Is there a slight possibility that it's a person doing this? Some people are sick. I had someone steal a hen just to slam her down on cement. That knocked the hen unconscious. I think that the same person also might of broke the wing of another one of my birds.
Yes. An owl can go after your ducks, but I've heard of them eating them where they find them. The attacks being every 1-4 nights makes me think that it's a raccoon. Is there a possibility that the duck broke it's own neck trying to fly away or something and it flew into a wall or something?

 

[BigBlueHen53]

It was all stiff with rigormortis but bent at 90 degrees at one point only on the neck, where it felt like there was no bone connection.It also made a weird clicking sound. I kill chickens with the neck dislocation method so I'm familiar with the feeling of a broken neck. I could be convinced that it scrambled in terror and somehow caught its neck and broke it. Ducks are pretty panicky and bad at finding their way.

Do you think it could have just had a heart attack or something? Died of shock during the attack?

Thank you for this detail. This, to me, is fairly convincing that your bird did have its neck broken somehow. Canids will grab prey and shake it, which can result in a broken neck. I don't think cats kill that way. So now I'm more inclined to believe it's a fox. I say fox rather than coyote because I think a fox is more likely to make that leap over the fence and get through the network over the top, but I could be wrong. I just see foxes as being more agile of the two. Shrug, just my opinion.