Snapping turtle attacked gosling (**WARNING ** GRAPHIC PICTURES)

[jrobertson]

chickenpiedpiper is right. they may be a nuisance but they have their place in the ecosystem. removing all turtles from a pond will eventually upset the balance and make the fish in the pond more sickly. turtles usually prey on fish, crayfish, young waterfowl, carrion, and vegetation. the fish that turtles eat are usually the sick, weak, and old. but they will take ducklings from time to time. i have been trapping and keeping turtles years longer than i have ducks but i still love and respect them both. living in north alabama, we have some large snappers here including some alligator snappers. i trapped one last summer that weight 65lbs. they are protected here, so he was released where he was trapped.

 

[suburbanduckmom]

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That thing is going to give me nightmares! That is huge. I grew up with all kinds of animals and they all have their place on this earth but I would b scared to share my backyard with that guy

 

[GrumpyOldMan]

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If they are not kept in check they will kill everything in a pond. My brother-in-law had two breeding pair of ducks. In four years they hatched several clutches. The turtles either ate or killed every duckling. He had some very large Coy. He found them one by one dead with large pieces taken out of them. He finally started shooting turtles. The Coy and ducks are now doing fine.

 

[jrobertson]

like anything not kept in check, things can go awry. proper management....yes. annihilated.....no. too many ducks in a pond, and the pond ecological status goes kaput. it's all relative. i love my ducks and would not even think about placing them at risk. but somethings are just natural and it's our place to keep the appropriate balance in our made-made bodies of water.

 

[desertdarlene]

That turtle looks like it could eat a full grown goose!

 

[Oven Ready]

That's amazing, sorry for the little duck looks like he had a lucky escape.

We have small turtles in our pond but I only ever see them diving down when pulling weed out. I don't know what they are but they can't be much bigger than the size of my hand.
We don't have ducks though - maybe it would be different if we did !

Do those big turtles bite people? I sure looks like it would hurt a lot, in fact it looks like it could pull you under !

 

[ugly ducky]

You bet they will bite if you corner them, and a Snapper bite is VERY painful. They have been known to remove fingers or worse. They won't come looking for you, but if you go after them, they will defend themselves very effectively. Snappers are probably the most prehistoric animal left in this world, and when humans move into their area, and put ducks out on an existing pond, it's only common sense that they will kill some ducks. IT"S THEIR HABITAT! Everything comes with risks, and if you're going to put domestic ducks on a natural pond, then there will be losses, whether it be from turtles, big fish, coyotes, foxes, hawks, or whatever.
Nothing irritates me more than city folk who move to the country, and then start killing every bit of wildlife that lives there. We have a pond on our land, but our ducks don't get to visit it. I feel I brought the ducks in, and it's my responsibility to keep them safe from the natural dangers that lurk here. They have their own artificial pools to swim in, and are as safe from the predators as I can make them without disturbing the balance of nature that exists here. This way, we can enjoy the country without removing the reasons we moved here in the first place.

 

[katharinad]

I agree, as beautiful a pond is it is not a safe place. Plus duck will mess up the shoreline really fast. Same for garden ponds, they may be safe, but you will no longer enjoy them once the ducks have shredded all the water plants and perhaps the liner on top of it. Stock tanks are another option, but they take a long time to empty and to refill. I've opted for kiddie pools because they are easy to drain with a ball valve and don't take that long to refill. I've purchased the medium and the large one from Walmart and build duck decks with stairs around them. They love it, preening themselves on the decks all day long. Plus they love to lay under the large deck when it gets really hot. I even have a shade cloth hanging over the pools. It protects them from flying predators and reduces the sun on them. I empty the pools each night and give them a good rinse. They get filled the first thing in the morning so the ducks can enjoy their clean bath. Other animals cannot fall into the pools and drown at night, since we empty them. Best we have no algae in any of our pools, because they dry out each night.

 

[Red Maple Farms]

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A little bit big for the ducks to mess up the shore line, don't you think?

 

[Red Maple Farms]

Looked at the wound today and it was clean. The gosling was in good spirits so I let him out of the pen. Last I saw him he was bathing in the pond where he got attacked.

I was going to post it in the Predators and Pests section where the responses would be typical. Instead I posted it here to show people how to treat wounded waterfowl without having to resort to expensive veterinary care. Besides, a little shock value is needed in the Ducks section.

A little history on the pond. It was an old cedar swamp with a seasonal stream running through it, until they put in a rairoad spur for logging purposes about a hundred years ago. The railroad embankment blocked off the stream and a pond resulted. Up until five years ago it was dumping ground for beer cans, unwanted furniture, tires, etc. The road was known as mosquito alley, because the pond was extremely shallow, hot, fetid, and quite the breeding ground. I then cleaned up the garbage, raised the water level with a dam, and put ducks on it. Suddenly, there is now life everywhere. Bald eagles and other birds can be seen roosting in ther trees along the edge. Deer come by to drink. Frogs, minnows and tadpoles are everywhere. The mosquito population has become manageable due to the ducks eating the larve. The aquatic vegetation no longer chokes the life pond as it did before. Even snapping turtles can be seen crossing the dirt roads trying to gain access to it. Futhermore, people frequently stop by and tell me that is the best thing that ever happened to this pond.

I truly believe that a duck farm was the best thing to happen there too. Also, the limit is 100 adult ducks, or 33 1/3 ducks per acre.