Aggressive mother duck(s) with ducklings

[Rebeccagane]

Hi everyone, I’m in need of some advice as this is my first set of ducklings that I’ve let my ducks raise themselves. These ducks are very recent editions to the flock, I've had them just over a month (they didn't waste any time getting comfortable!) and they haven't really warmed up to humans and have pretty standoffish.

• Yesterday morning we had 6 new ducklings hatch, 6 out of 8 . Since then, my two ducks have decided they are sort of.... co—parenting them. Both female ducks sit with them in the nest box and are generally with the ducklings at all times. Is that common?
  
  
• They’ve also become super aggressive towards me, showing signs of stress when I go to feed them, lunging at me etc. When I was tidying the aviary I saw a duckling stuck in the pond trying to get out (new set up - still working out the kinks and making it duckling friendly!) attempting to help a duckling that was stuck in the pond both ducks went berserk and flew at me.
  

I’m worried that the ducklings will be frightened of humans when I eventually go to sell them, or that mum won’t even let me near them in the first place. I've seen threads about how drakes are the problem but my drake has been good as gold which is a bizarre twist!


Any advice?


I've seen some threads say to that if the mother is aggressive you should raise the ducklings yourself to avoid them being "wild", but obviously I'd rather let her raise them as she worked hard to bring them into the world! However if that's the best way to go, I may just need to.

 

[chickens really]

Definitely they all can be aggressive when the Ducklings first hatch. They are being excellent Momma Ducks. The behaviour has nothing to do with the hens not being tame enough. As the Ducklings grow the Momma Ducks will calm down. I toss out treats and by feeding and watering them they associate you with good things. Don't remove them from the Hens.
Congrats on the babies...

 

[Rebeccagane]

That's encouraging!!

Thanks for the advice, much appreciated.

 

[chickens really]

That's encouraging!!

Thanks for the advice, much appreciated.

Your welcome..I always call my Hens crocodiles when they hatch out Ducklings because my Once calm Hens get aggressive towards me too..

 

[DuckWhisperer06]

That’s pretty normal behavior, they’re just trying to protect their babies. Aggression towards people is pretty normal because they may see you as a threat to their ducklings. Like @chickens really mentioned, they’ll ease up in time. I’d only worry if they start being aggressive towards the ducklings. We slipped some incubator ducklings under our two broody ducks a little less than a month ago. One took to them really well but the other got jealous and they pretty much fought over the little ones. We ended up having to take them and put them in a brooder.

 

[casportpony]

Is that common?

Very common here. Sometimes I have 3-4 ducks taking care of ducklings.

They’ve also become super aggressive towards me, showing signs of stress when I go to feed them, lunging at me etc.

Not sure what to say. Some of mine act like this, but I don't worry about it.