Help with Drakes

[Ducklover77]

First off let me paint a picture for you.

We have 6 Ducks

2 Female Khackis - 17 weeks old
2 Male Pekin - 17 weeks old
2 Female Welsh Harlequins - 5.5 weeks old

The one drake, (lets call him jack) is clearly the dominate drake and he is almost obsessed with the 2 khacki females. If the passive drake (lets call him bob) is near one of them Jack will then move in-between them. Yesterday we found Jack on top of both of the khackis in the pond and in the coop. Jack also will chase the welsh harlequins, he puts his head down and charges them until i step in-between them and then Jack(ass) will back down.

When we bought the first 4 ducks we bought them from tractor supply and when i asked about the difference in colors of ducks i was told " they are just different colors" at the time we had no idea they were different breeds of ducks and it just so happened that the two massive ducks turned out to be males.

We are trying to figure out what to do with our situation. Jack and Bob are about 2-3x the size of the khacki's and we are worried they will hurt them. The one khacki's is the size of the 5.5 week old welsh harlequin so they are not big at all.

Getting rid of the drakes is our last resort. A local farm will take them in but we would love for this to just work out without having to re-home some of our ducks we love them and don't want to do this but we also want to insure the 4 females will not be hurt.

If anyone has some advice good or bad please let us know.


I feel your pain the Muscovies are going completely crazy in my neighborhood and it's getting so out of hand that my mama muscovy had lost her ducklings last night due to getting raped by two wild Drake's. But come to find out the other mama that she was hanging around with ended up taking all of her babies except two across the pond where my Muscovies don't go. So this morning I watched the hen bring my Mamas babies back to her but the ducklings are not going back to their mom and the situation is just bad so these Drake's are just causing so many problems seems like everywhere right now. If anyone has any ideas for me I'm up for suggestions also.
View attachment 1823352

 

[Bill83]

Update: So after watching them for a few days it appears that the 1 Female Khacki is almost calling in the 1 Drake to mount her. She runs around and quacks and makes a mess in the pool until he comes to see her and then shell flatten out in the water and hell get on top of her. When shes done shell leave and he doesnt chase her or force anything on her.

BUT he is still being very aggressive to the younger WH females and he will chase them across the yard. I supervise and dont let him get to them but he is very persistent on going after them. My wife was carrying one of the 6 week old WHs outside this morning and he was pecking at her legs and being aggressive to her now. I take it as hes protecting his current flock of 4 i'm just hoping he will adjust to the WH's and take them into the flock soon.

 

[chickens really]

Wait till he goes into eclipse and then introduce the young Ducks. Are you positive all are Hens?

 

[Bill83]

Wait till he goes into eclipse and then introduce the young Ducks. Are you positive all are Hens?

How often do they eclipse and how do i know when that is? Metzer farm sexed us 2 female WH's we are not 100% sure they are both female yet they are only 6 weeks old. We will know soon.

 

[chickens really]

How often do they eclipse and how do i know when that is? Metzer farm sexed us 2 female WH's we are not 100% sure they are both female yet they are only 6 weeks old. We will know soon.

The Drakes will molt and take on a Hens colour till his eclipse is over and will grow back his pretty plumage.

 

[Bill83]

The Drakes will molt and take on a Hens colour till his eclipse is over and will grow back his pretty plumage.

The male is a pekin so the hens are white also, so how can you know when its happening ?

 

[chickens really]

The male is a pekin so the hens are white also

Well anyways he will become calm and have zero interest really in the Hens and will molt..

 

[thumper650]

@DuckyDonna does your drake calm down in the fall / winter or are they like this all year round ?

mine calm down completely in the fall/winter. I’m hoping that won’t change since I have one girl on the premises now!