Hello,
I live in Lake County, Florida. I was surprised by a black-bellied whistling-duck behavior in a bad way. I have a pair of adult black-bellied whistling-duck with 2 ducklings that I a see a few times a day for the last couple of weeks. One of the adults quite often sits on my dock (I think it is the male of the pair). I have noticed he often flies directly at other other adult b-b whistling-duck when they land on the dock or in the water near the dock (like in attack mode). My neighbor and I were surprised by this behavior but it is not why I am writing today. Today another b-b whistling-duck showed up with 5 ducklings. The one adult (female) with the two ducklings does not seemed bothered by the mom with 5ducklings. But her male partner does. Multiple times he flew in attack mode directly at the mom with the 5 ducklings. A few of time she chased her for 100 yards. When he separates the mom from her 5 ducklings, he attacks the ducklings. He lands on top of them like he is trying to drown them while trying to peck them. His actions shocked me. The mom with the 5 ducklings does not seem to have a partner. The aggressive male has attacked the mom and 5 ducklings when its partner and her ducklings are more than 75 yards away, and 30 yards of of that is tall cattails. When I stepped out of my porch with my camera to video the attacks the male quits and flies to his partner. There are about 8-10 whistling ducks that arrived midsummer. Since this is the first year we have had whistling ducks we are not familiar with their behavior. Is what the males is doing common to this species?
I live in Lake County, Florida. I was surprised by a black-bellied whistling-duck behavior in a bad way. I have a pair of adult black-bellied whistling-duck with 2 ducklings that I a see a few times a day for the last couple of weeks. One of the adults quite often sits on my dock (I think it is the male of the pair). I have noticed he often flies directly at other other adult b-b whistling-duck when they land on the dock or in the water near the dock (like in attack mode). My neighbor and I were surprised by this behavior but it is not why I am writing today. Today another b-b whistling-duck showed up with 5 ducklings. The one adult (female) with the two ducklings does not seemed bothered by the mom with 5ducklings. But her male partner does. Multiple times he flew in attack mode directly at the mom with the 5 ducklings. A few of time she chased her for 100 yards. When he separates the mom from her 5 ducklings, he attacks the ducklings. He lands on top of them like he is trying to drown them while trying to peck them. His actions shocked me. The mom with the 5 ducklings does not seem to have a partner. The aggressive male has attacked the mom and 5 ducklings when its partner and her ducklings are more than 75 yards away, and 30 yards of of that is tall cattails. When I stepped out of my porch with my camera to video the attacks the male quits and flies to his partner. There are about 8-10 whistling ducks that arrived midsummer. Since this is the first year we have had whistling ducks we are not familiar with their behavior. Is what the males is doing common to this species?
