Bird Pictures: Unusual Ducks along Bingley Canal: Young Aylesbury Ducks, Blue Swedish Duck, Rouen Duck
These are domestic birds that have either escapeed or been released from poultry keepers. Now they live wild along my stretch of the Leeds to Liverpool Canal.
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| Aylesbury Ducks, Blue Swedish Duck, Rouen Duck |
Birding and bird photography is not an exact science: none of the birds have read the expert's books so surprises and mysteries are not uncommon. This photo journal documents, with original duck pictures, just one such mystery. Who's yer mama? Who's yer papa?
Early this year, while birdwatching along Bingley Canal, I spotted a poor female mallard duck being mated by first a big white Aylesbury Duck and then by a dark Blue Swedish Duck. Several weeks later a brood of six youngsters appeared. Four are white Aylesbury ducks, one is a Splodged Blue Swedish Duck and the last has mallard colouring but is much bigger than the normal mallard duck and it has an upturning tail like the Aylesbury Ducks.
The question is - are these the result of that mating? There was no female with the ducklings which would have answered the question. The ducklings were about 5-6 weeks old by the time I saw them first. However, the colouring of the darkest duckling strongly suggested that was the case and I understand that a duck's eggs can be fertilized by different males so it could be possible, which would answer the question of why some of the brood are of Aylesbury ancestry and some are of Swedish ducks descent.
On Bingley canal we have a resident group of two Aylesbury Ducks and Three Blue Swedish Ducks that had been released from a domestic poultry keeper. One of the dark Swedish Blues has been absent for a long time. It only reappeared this week, with 4 tiny ducklings of her own.
So we have another possible answer to the parentry of the ducklings pictured here. It may be possible that this Blue Swedish Duck laid and hatched these as a first brood. Like other ducks, if she had been mated after hatching her first brood, she may have laid a second clutch. If so, she would have had to leave the first ducklings to their own devices while she sat on the second lot of eggs.
The timings would fit with that scenario. If it wasn't for that single, beautiful, dark duckling with mallard markings this would be my guess. What do you think?
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| a mismash of ducks |
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| Young Aylesbury Ducks, Blue Swedish Duck and Rouen Duck |
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| Young Aylesbury Ducks, Blue Swedish Duck and Rouen Duck |
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| Young Aylesbury Ducks, Blue Swedish Duck and Rouen Duck |
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| Young Aylesbury Ducks, Blue Swedish Duck and Rouen Duck |
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Young Aylesbury Ducks, Blue Swedish Duck and Rouen Duck
The Aylesbury duck in the foreground has a deformed beak |
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| Blue Swedish Duck |
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| Blue Swedish Duck and Aylesbury ducks |
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| Blue Swedish Duck and Aylesbury ducks |
.jpg "Rouen Duck") |
Rouen Duck |
5 Week Old Aylesbury Ducks they still have some of their baby fluff
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| 5 Week Old Aylesbury Ducks |
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| 5 Week Old Aylesbury Ducks |
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| 5 Week Old Aylesbury Ducks |
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| 5 Week Old Aylesbury Ducks |
I am rasing money to feed the Greenhill Geese (and the ducks!) over the winter - something I do every year. They do get fed a lot by visitors with bread but bread actually has no nutritional value for birds and they cannot digest it properly so I buy grain so for then. It's expensive! So if you can help even with £1 or $1 and if you enjoy my pictures go to my FundRazr page --> Feed Greenhill Geese.
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