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This is not true.... Domesticated ducks are not as good at finding food or shelter as wild ducks because all their wild instincts have been bred out of them over many thousands of years. They are about as hopeless as a domestic house dog who gets out/runs away. If they are not located, they usually end up getting hit by cars, or they starve because human bred their hunting abilities out of them.
I would leave some food out for them. If you can somehow float food, like greens out on the water, that will help ensure they get calories. Post a sign, ask around, see if they belong to anybody. If not, use the peas to lure them to the shore so you can catch them. they are beautiful and there are many many people here just on BYC who'd happily take those little lovelys and give them a good home.
the mallard-y looking one looks like a cross to me (I've seen a lot of ducks). He appears to have the bleu-gelb gene which makes him more "apricot colored" than the normal standard mallard. He does look to have some runner in him too. I'm glad she has a friend, but they are both at risk.
Some ducks make great foragers, especially ones who live with responsible owners who lock them up at night and show them where to eat. Most free ranging foraging ducks still have duck pellets available to them in case they didn't forage enough.
Considering she and her friend just showed up one day tells me, either someone bought some adults and need to be educated about locking them up at night so they don't get snatched by a predator, or they were dumped. Since your in the south, they could be this year's hatch, (hatched in Jan, they'd be fully grown by now). I was able to buy ducklings in the heart of alabama in Jan. This also tells me they didn't grow up foraging and they are now doing it for the first time.
Please get these ducks some help!
oh how wrong and misinformed that is! I live in a very rural area with tons and tons and tons of farm ponds and streams and creeks, and 90% of them have domestic strains of ducks on them. Noone feeds these ducks, they eat aquatic plants, grass, insects. etc. Not a one of them have "duck pellets", and i havent seen any dying of starvation.
Unless you see the numbers of ducks on the rural ponds greatly increasing every year, they ARE being done in by something. Let's say you have a single pair, conservatively estimating one clutch of a dozen hatch in a year. Many of the babies get eaten, some pulled under the water by snapping turtles, leaving no trace. Let's say two survive to adulthood and you've already doubled the population. Multiply that by all the local ducks...
As for as foraging, sure they'll muddle by as best they can. What do they do in winter, when things aren't growing so much or are covered in snow and the ponds in ice? When an animal in the wild dies of "starvation", it's not like you see emaciated bodies laying around. The lack of proper nutrition makes them weaker and less able to escape predators: dogs, foxes, coyotos, and yes even big hawks. So you are seeing the survivors of a numbers game and not the certainly much higher number of those that did not make it.
The ducks in your area may have some advantage by having generations of them "on their own" to teach the young 'uns how to forage. And Darwin in miniature, the strong survivors should be passing on their strong genes, though I'm not sure how many generations that would take. It won't be nearly as effective as a completely wild duck, but they will be somewhat better equipped that a young domestic duck born in captivity and released on a local pond.
You can say "That's nature" which would be true if these were wild animals. But they are not wild, because of human intervention. I forget who said this and I'm sure it's not vervatim, but it goes something like "We are responsible for that which we domesticate,"
This is not true.... Domesticated ducks are not as good at finding food or shelter as wild ducks because all their wild instincts have been bred out of them over many thousands of years. They are about as hopeless as a domestic house dog who gets out/runs away. If they are not located, they usually end up getting hit by cars, or they starve because human bred their hunting abilities out of them.
I would leave some food out for them. If you can somehow float food, like greens out on the water, that will help ensure they get calories. Post a sign, ask around, see if they belong to anybody. If not, use the peas to lure them to the shore so you can catch them. they are beautiful and there are many many people here just on BYC who'd happily take those little lovelys and give them a good home.
the mallard-y looking one looks like a cross to me (I've seen a lot of ducks). He appears to have the bleu-gelb gene which makes him more "apricot colored" than the normal standard mallard. He does look to have some runner in him too. I'm glad she has a friend, but they are both at risk.
Some ducks make great foragers, especially ones who live with responsible owners who lock them up at night and show them where to eat. Most free ranging foraging ducks still have duck pellets available to them in case they didn't forage enough.
Considering she and her friend just showed up one day tells me, either someone bought some adults and need to be educated about locking them up at night so they don't get snatched by a predator, or they were dumped. Since your in the south, they could be this year's hatch, (hatched in Jan, they'd be fully grown by now). I was able to buy ducklings in the heart of alabama in Jan. This also tells me they didn't grow up foraging and they are now doing it for the first time.
Please get these ducks some help!
oh how wrong and misinformed that is! I live in a very rural area with tons and tons and tons of farm ponds and streams and creeks, and 90% of them have domestic strains of ducks on them. Noone feeds these ducks, they eat aquatic plants, grass, insects. etc. Not a one of them have "duck pellets", and i havent seen any dying of starvation.
Unless you see the numbers of ducks on the rural ponds greatly increasing every year, they ARE being done in by something. Let's say you have a single pair, conservatively estimating one clutch of a dozen hatch in a year. Many of the babies get eaten, some pulled under the water by snapping turtles, leaving no trace. Let's say two survive to adulthood and you've already doubled the population. Multiply that by all the local ducks...
As for as foraging, sure they'll muddle by as best they can. What do they do in winter, when things aren't growing so much or are covered in snow and the ponds in ice? When an animal in the wild dies of "starvation", it's not like you see emaciated bodies laying around. The lack of proper nutrition makes them weaker and less able to escape predators: dogs, foxes, coyotos, and yes even big hawks. So you are seeing the survivors of a numbers game and not the certainly much higher number of those that did not make it.
The ducks in your area may have some advantage by having generations of them "on their own" to teach the young 'uns how to forage. And Darwin in miniature, the strong survivors should be passing on their strong genes, though I'm not sure how many generations that would take. It won't be nearly as effective as a completely wild duck, but they will be somewhat better equipped that a young domestic duck born in captivity and released on a local pond.
You can say "That's nature" which would be true if these were wild animals. But they are not wild, because of human intervention. I forget who said this and I'm sure it's not vervatim, but it goes something like "We are responsible for that which we domesticate,"
