Will a muscovy duck fly away?

[SolarDuck]

I always say yes, if your muscovy has wings that aren't clipped they are likely to eventually fly away. They don't have to be unhappy to fly away. Maybe they just see a flock of ducks fly by one day and decide to join the flock, maybe they just get bored and decide to go explore the area because flying is fun. I live in Florida, and we have massive problems here with people having captive mucovy ducks that end up flying away and because of it there is a huge population of feral muscovy ducks here. I think that if you don't have them in a completely closed in run they cannot fly out of its good to clip the wings.

 

[Puddingtheamericana]

If there are things that they can fly and hop to, they can get higher than 6 feet. In my run, they have "flown" and hopped to the top of the chicken coop and that is 8 ft tall.
However, they've never flown away. I kept them penned for a good 4 months before I let them wander our open backyard. I've actually only clipped their wings to try to keep them out of my chicken coop and they still managed to hop over a 4' fence, glide, land and then walk into the chicken coop up the ramp.
Muscovy can also climb. But, if you get drakes a short hop is about all that they can manage once they get over a yr old.
I love my muscovy. They are less messy than their mallard cousins. But, they can be a handful.

we have a tall persimmon tree that our chickens are always going into, the very top, and getting out. you don’t think a muscovy would climb up the tree do you

 

[SolarDuck]

we have a tall persimmon tree that our chickens are always going into, the very top, and getting out. you don’t think a muscovy would climb up the tree do you

Yes they will, muscovy love to perch in trees.

 

[Crazy Maizie]

we have a tall persimmon tree that our chickens are always going into, the very top, and getting out. you don’t think a muscovy would climb up the tree do you

Yes, if they were determined to, they could. They are actually a wood duck. In the wild they perch in trees.

 

[Crazy Maizie]

http://paynederosa.com/paynederosa_photos

Muscovy in a tree. This photo came from the link above.

 

[JaeG]

We have lots of trees (my bantams have even been nesting in them!) but our Muscovy have never flown up into them, so I suppose it depends on the birds. I've never seen them perch on anything around our place, not fence posts or even logs lying on the ground. They are far too focused on searching the grass for bugs and lizards.

 

[Crazy Maizie]

We have lots of trees (my bantams have even been nesting in them!) but our Muscovy have never flown up into them, so I suppose it depends on the birds. I've never seen them perch on anything around our place, not fence posts or even logs lying on the ground. They are far too focused on searching the grass for bugs and lizards.

My girls have perched on a 4.5' welded wire fence and it's not really meant for perching - it's just set up as a divider in the run area. Silly muscovy.
I agree it depends on the individual muscovy.