What on earth? (duck fight)

[Going Quackers]

To my surprise this morning when letting the flock out my one 17week old drake and one of my 6mth old hens got into a fight!

Now what the heck is going on? should i be concerned? They are all housed together... i'll give you a break down

one 6mth old drake

two 17week old drakes

two 6mth old hens

and finally three 7mth old hens

The 17 week olds and the 6mth old free range daily together and the 7mth old are to new to the farm so are kept penned during the day.

There has been NO problems before... I do not intend to keep the 17week old drakes long term, sadly i had hoped they would be hens but since there not i felt i could keep them till spring & then re-home but the events of this morning have me questioning this choice.

Thoughts please? as i said no animosity has been seen so far this is totally new behaviour.

 

[newbyduckmom]

I have two older drakes and two younger hens. When the drakes first started trying to breed (and actually occasionally still) the younger hens would fight them off. The drakes were about 5 months and the hens were about 3 months. I still have one hen that consistently fights off the Khaki drakes - she prefers the Magpie drakes attention. Hasn't really resulted in any injuries here. The drakes just pursue the more agreeable hens.

 

[GrannyCarol]

I'd guess they are working on who's boss. Most duck fights are a bit of breast pushing and feather pulling and in a few days they settle it and it's over. Sometimes the girls tell the boys "what for" - should be no big deal. I agree that she probably doesn't want his affections, as he's breeding age and she's borderline.

 

[Going Quackers]

Ok... well thanks for the reassurance. It truly surprised me, i guess just took me off guard. It has seemed to of calmed down i kept a close eye from the paddock while tending the horses.. They were all so vocal this morning but i was still taken aback when it all kicked off lol