How many hens for one drake?

[Duckowner1479]

My Muscovy keeps chasing my Pekin in their pen and grabbing onto her neck and back, she’s getting quite annoyed and is beginning is miss feathers on her neck. How many more hens should I get so they don’t get hurt too badly? I’ve separated my female from the male, but the male tries to get to her and I don’t know if she likes being away from him despite trying to get away when she’s with him.

 

[Duck mommy 2019]

i would get 2-3 more girls, but i have no experience with muscovy. @Miss Lydia can help.

 

[Texag87]

4 to 1 seems to be the ratio. We lost a hen to snakebite a couple months ago and the three remaining ones appear to be paying the price.

 

[3bird]

We have silver Appleyards (large breed). At one point we had two drakes with five hens, and that worked out mostly. We now have one drake and five hens, and it works, but we do have to manage them ~April-August. Our two cents is that, no matter the size of your flock, if you are going to keep a drake, you need to have a way to separate your ducks into groups but so they can still be all together. Personally, we would not go to less than 4:1, but I think it really also depends on the flock and the circumstances.

 

[Beaglegal]

My Muscovy keeps chasing my Pekin in their pen and grabbing onto her neck and back, she’s getting quite annoyed and is beginning is miss feathers on her neck. How many more hens should I get so they don’t get hurt too badly? I’ve separated my female from the male, but the male tries to get to her and I don’t know if she likes being away from him despite trying to get away when she’s with him.

My drake had 6 females and he didn’t pick on any of them but 1. I think it depends on the drake. Add another one and see what happens