separation of ducks from group

[Eric Rosario]

morning friends, i have a question as i'm not sure with this.
we had to separate our ducks before the season to two groups, they share one fence and they are still sticking together from both sides, seems they are very used to each other. in both groups we have males and females.
group A contain drakes that seems to be dominant over drakes in group B, and we need that drakes from group B will mate with the females within their group.
so my question is, if they still feel the presence of the other group of the drakes from group A, could females from group B reject drakes B, or will drakes from B be afraid to try to mate with them?
we need both groups till the eggs are laid and hatched.
they are separated since this weekend after several months they've been growing up together so the connection is strong.
i feel sad when i see them wandering around trying to find the way to be together but we had to separate them to get the desired ducklings, otherwise it would be hard to identify which female laid the eggs found and from which drake it is fertilized.
thank you.

 

[DuckyDonna]

morning friends, i have a question as i'm not sure with this.
we had to separate our ducks before the season to two groups, they share one fence and they are still sticking together from both sides, seems they are very used to each other. in both groups we have males and females.
group A contain drakes that seems to be dominant over drakes in group B, and we need that drakes from group B will mate with the females within their group.
so my question is, if they still feel the presence of the other group of the drakes from group A, could females from group B reject drakes B, or will drakes from B be afraid to try to mate with them?
we need both groups till the eggs are laid and hatched.
they are separated since this weekend after several months they've been growing up together so the connection is strong.
i feel sad when i see them wandering around trying to find the way to be together but we had to separate them to get the desired ducklings, otherwise it would be hard to identify which female laid the eggs found and from which drake it is fertilized.
thank you.

Makes perfect sense to me. I'm going to have the same thing going on here with my flock to and am also wondering if anyone has any ideas on how to do this so that nobody is sad.

Last year I had to separate my drake from the 6 girls because apparently 6 wasn't quite enough for him and my poor girls didn't have any neck feathers left. It broke my heart to see him and the girls running the fence line all day trying to get at each other. He was lonely so I put his best girlfriend in with him and then all was good. For some reason, he wasn't into mating with her as much as the others. Man, I had blu-kote everywhere! What a mess!

 

[MeganFair]

The drakes from each group should mate just fine. They may just need to get used to being separated.

 

[DuckyDonna]

@thumper650 was helping me out yesterday with ideas for keeping my drakes in "jail" during the heavy mating season and he uses a "no-fly zone" which is a double fence so they can't fight through the fence. I'm thinking its a fence running parallel to the existing one about a foot apart or so. I guess it would depend on the breed how far apart. Runners have pretty long necks!

 

[Eric Rosario]

The drakes from each group should mate just fine. They may just need to get used to being separated.

i hope so, as we need to get eggs from the females to be fertilized by the desired drakes only. i'v checked them today its just fourth day and they are still holding themselves near the fence together. any idea how much time they need?

 

[Miss Lydia]

When I had to separate my gander from his Muscovy mama/ wife ( long story) I ended up putting a solid barrier up so he couldn’t see her on the other side of the fence. Out of sight out of mind eventually. Tarps, landscaping material etc will work. I was wanting him to bond with the female goose I had brought home.

 

[Eric Rosario]

I was thinking about puting non transparent barier on the fence so they wont be able to see each other. but they will hear and feel the presence anyway. before we were thinking about to putting them elsewhere a bit more far away from each other.

 

[Miss Lydia]

It worked for my gander but it still took about 3 months for my 2 to bond but they didn’t know each other. My Muscovy female could have cared less.

 

[Eric Rosario]

our ducks know each other they grew up together, some where added later but still they get used to it, i've seen them even today, the main group is walkin around their area and the other group is just trying to find the way to them not inspecting their area, they just stick to the same place near the shared wall. i feel like i want to allow them to be togehter, but on the otherside we loose the purpose why they need to be separated.

 

[Miss Lydia]

Explain why? Are you trying to mate pure breeds?