Mallard hybrids. What bred with what?

[alindsay]

Once upon a time (about 5 years ago) an upright, bottle green duck appeared in my local park in S Beds. He or she mated and has left a strange hybrid breed of duck as its legacy.

The first 2 photos are of the offspring from 2 years ago with their own offspring (which is much bigger than an ordinary mallard juvenile), taken today





...the next 2 photos are of this year's offspring, brother & sister I assume, but utterly freaky when you see upright mallards about 3ft tall rushing towards you, also taken today. (Note the stripey faces).





What was the original duck? It looked more upright than photo 1, approx 2ft tall and ..... where will it all lead?

If the tribe get taller each year, I shall not be walking in the park alone again!!!!!

[aeshna5]

They're all various domestic permutations of Mallard- no other species involved here. I'm not very well up on domestic breeds but the very upright birds are like an Indian Runner type.

[diggleken]

Aeshna's right.
Indian Runners have been in these islands for over 150 yrs, so no wories...........but this might be interesting - we seem to get lots of queries about domestic ducks, this site tells it all, mind, apart from hybrids that is.................
Indian Runner Ducks /Domestic waterfowl Club
Cheers
Ken

[alindsay]

Thanks aeshna5 for the quick respose & diggleken for the link.

My Mallard hybrids certainly were able to run and had the distinctive stripes on their faces, even if their colouring was pure mallard. Still weird though.

Maybe the question should have been what did the original runner duck mate with to produce the bottle green runner ducks?

Isn't nature full of surprises?