Black Duck Nastiness and Confusion

A saved entry from Tuesday, 20/19/07

It was another boiling day today, too hot to visit the duckpond for most hours. The temperature started to cool down in the afternoon, however, so Mantichora and I decided to see if the wood ducks had returned.

Upon our arrival, it started to rain! Finally! I was worried the birds would shelter in the rain or it would be difficult to photograph them, but it was only spitting and I soon spotted two Midlings were feeding around the ‘shore’* (the other was standing on a rock near that cycad) and there, Mantichora met the new black ducklings for the first time.




At this point I wondered where the Cutiechicks were, and started looking for them. Maybe they were resting on the island, as I’d seen the Midlings do when they were smaller. If they were, they were hidden (not exactly with difficulty, considering their size and the amount of plants).

As I made my way round, I saw a baby sparrow following its father around, begging for food. The way they do that is so cute! The dad-sparrow tried to get away from it and was forced to take flight, with the chick chasing it.

The black duck family appeared again, one adult and eight chicks. I was watching them when suddenly, the adult attacked one of the babies!

Now, I know black ducks are aggressive, and I’ve seen parent birds in general ‘discipline’ their young. For a moment I thought this was happening, but something was wrong. The adult chased the duckling, as the occasional ones do to the Snuggleducks (the original black ducklings I visited), but instead of a nasty peck, it bit again and again, clearly aiming for the neck and trying to hang on. The poor, shrieking duckling was absolutely helpless, and so tiny that the duck managed to lift and thrash it from side to side. By the neck.

All of this happened within seconds, and I panicked and tried shouting and stomping at the water’s edge, bluffing a charge to scare it off. It gave a split second of distraction for the duckling to get away, and the adult immediately chased. I threw a stick at it and it left. The rest of the ducklings followed closely behind; meanwhile, the little outcast disappeared between the lily pads.



I watched the seven remaining ducklings go, worried, but was distracted when this bird landed nearby:



It was the second time I had seen it, and it let me come within a few metres. What bird it is, I didn't know at the time, but later found out was a nankeen night heron, in its breeding plumage.

Mantichora met up with me at this point, and I showed him the black duck family, who looked okay until the adult started to attack another duckling! I scared it off, luckily, but now there were two ducklings separated from the flock. We could hear them cheeping loudly on the edge of the island while the rest of the family swam in the opposite direction, with only six ducklings left. They were alive, but without a family, for how long?

The whole thing was really upsetting. Mantichora and I tried to come up with an explanation. I expressed my fear that there must be a reason for such high numbers of babies (a high mortality rate – but at the hands of their own parents?), and he suggested that there might be more than one black duck family here. We saw more vicious fighting between adult black ducks – one even attacked the heron! – which made me wonder… until we saw the other black duck family, coming back ‘round from where the cheeping outcasts were! Mantichora was right!



Well, that explained a lot. I still felt awful knowing that that other duck would have killed two helpless babies just because they apparently weren't its own, but at least they had a family to return to who would protect them.

There are actually nine ducklings in this family, making fifteen ducklings. No wonder there is so much fighting (yes, it continued today - one duck even attacked the heron! ); two families competing for the same territory and trying to protect their young at all costs.

We headed back after that. We didn’t visit the Snuggleducks; we’d had a bit too much for one day to head over to their pond as well. There was no sign of the Cutiechicks, who were probably on the island, or the wood ducks, who I had hoped to photograph, having missed them yesterday. We did see a wood duck,at least; a lonesome adult female:




* The ‘shore’ is the part of the pond where someone appears to have dumped a large pile of stones, etc at least a year ago (that’s not necessarily what happened; that’s just my explanation), and the eroded result is the most natural border of the pond (the rest is abruptly cut off with bricks). Birds love to wade around this small area. A flock of mynas or starlings bathing here is a common sight; clearly, they feel safe here, despite its close proximity to chairs and a footpath.