Ok, so in town here we have a lot of ducks living in the canals, so I’ve been able to pay more attention to them this year than usual. Early in the spring they seemed to form monogamous pairs-- I had heard that ducks were strong pair-bonding type maters, so this all made sense. The same duck couples hung out for weeks, had duckings which swam about oh-so-adorably. Everything all right so far.
Now, late spring and early summer something’s changed and gotten ugly. A) I keep seeing male ducks hanging out together in batches-- from 2 to 10-- like duck stag parties. B) I keep seeing the male ducks attacking females who are swimming around with the growing ducklings. C) A combination of these two phenomena in a disturbing way-- one male duck will attack a female duck and what looks like forcibly mate her-- jump on top of her and force her under water for maybe 30 seconds at a time while he flaps around. Meanwhile she just tries to keep her nostils near air every now and then. Today I saw a male clamp his bill around her foot and drag behind her as she tried to flap away, unsuccessfully. While this happens a group of additional males gathers around to attack her as well. The effect is disturbing-- quite violent. Duckie Clockwork Orange.
So. Gang-rape in mallards: Discuss. What’s going on here?
There was another thread about a documented instance of a mallard drake repeatedly raping the corpse of another bird, but I’m having difficulty finding it.
Clockwork Orange, Ducks, Orange Duck Sauce…there’s a pun in there somewhere. If only I weren’t at work…
I have witnessed duck gang rape as well. Our duck pond at college had a year rond supply of mallards. At no point in the mating season did I witness anything approaching pair bonding (unless ot lasted for like, 2 days). You could tell at a glance when mating season had arrived because all the females had no feathers left on the backs of their necks (cuz the boy ducks hop on the back and chomp down on the duck-nape). Upon closer observation one could witnessed what came to be known as a “duck rodeo” with between 2-5 males taking a turn hot-cotting the female. Before one could completely dismount another was hopping up on the other side. It was brutal. I can’t recall if ducklings ensued–if they did we could start butchering our knowledge of Darwin’s observations. Must just be a thing they do.
No, this was not at the University of Northern Colorado campus.
Yes, rape as you describe it is pretty much standard operating procedure in some species of ducks, especially mallards. In fact, mallards are so prone to this that they may be excluded from captive flocks due to the tendency of males to rape females of other species and produce hybrids.
Mallards will also indulge in necrophilia, known in the scientific literature as Davian behavior, after Dave, the hermit in the limerick who “kept a dead whore in his cave” (I am not making this up).
If a mallard mates with another species, will the union produce a viable offspring? I thought the definition of a species is that a viable, fertile offspring is the product of a union. The American Black Duck is Anas rubripes. The mallard is Anas platyrhyncos. The mottled duck is Anas fulvigula. I’ve heard of mallards interbreeding with the black or mottled producing a hybrid, but how is this possible? Perhaps they should be in the same species with sub-species? Or is the hybrid infertile?
Nah. That definition ( and it is just A definition, not THE definition ) involves reproductive isolation under natural conditions, which need not imply full genetic incompatability. It might be a purely behavioral isolation. Captive animals are not breeding under natural circumstances, therefore are not bound by those delineations.
Nonetheless, that is one of a number of reasons that the Biological Species Concept ( BSC ) is considered less than adequate by many - too many critters break the rules under even natural conditions all too often. Just ask Colibri about gulls - they’re a mess.
The concept of “species” is an entirely arbitrary and artificial human construct and has no real meaning in nature; ditto any general definitions of the word, therefore.
So. this ‘rape-on-his-mind’ mallard waddles into a drug store to purchase a pack of condoms.
“Will that be check or charge?” asks the pharmacist.
…and the mallard says
Mallard drakes will not only rape hen ducks of assorted species, I had one (a mallard/something cross with a big poof of feathers on top of its head) that raped hen chickens, or at least tried. I think he succeeded sometimes (ducks have a penis-type appendage and it, well, dangled afterward).
As for the hybrids, I imagine most of us have seen hybrid ducklings, patchwork white-and-green-and-brown, the product of a white duck and a mallard duck. The ones I have seen are universally fertile, so that a duck is a duck is a duck. They are obvious when you see them. Oh, and I found a bulletin board discussion of hybrid ducks that indicates crossbreeding between species is not at all uncommon.
Trivia: if you watch, in the movie Babe (the one about the pig), at some point you see the farmhouse in the distance, and the pond in the middle distance, and probably Babe in the foreground, singing Christmas carols, and in the pond the ducks are flapping around, mating.
Sigh. I am so disillusioned. I’d always liked the cute little duckies and gave them our old bread. Now I know they’re hardened sex offenders. You can’t go home again.
White domestic ducks such as the Pekin, like the vast majority of domestic ducks, are descended from Mallards, so they are actually the same species. Crosses and back-crosses are usually fully fertile
Some domestic ducks, however, are descended from the Muscovy Duck Cairina moschata of the Americas, which are not just a different species but a different genus. Fertility of crosses with other domestic ducks is low and hybrids are sterile.
However, many species of ducks in the genus Anas, to which the Mallard belongs, will produce completely fertile interspecies hybrids in captivity or in other abnormal circumstances.
It is a popular misconception that the Biological Species Concept requires that species do not produce fertile hybrids. As Tamerlane indicates, it only requires that such hybrids not be widespread or common under natural conditions.
RE: biological species concept misunderstanding. I did not know that. That is very interesting. You learn something new everyday. Now when some dope asks “can a squirrel and a chimpanzee have babies?” I’ll have to add more caveats. Sigh.
