Frequent readers know we have a lot of muscovy ducks around our house and neighborhood.

A few weeks ago one of the hens that really likes our house set up another nest. She’s nested here before. This nest has maybe 12-15 eggs in it now. She was a very dedicated mother. And of course, the kids grew very attached to her (named her “Nessie”).

This morning we checked on the nest. Nessie wasn’t there, which is unusual. I saw a lot of feathers around the nest, not just down, full feathers. I looked around a bit more and saw more feathers in a line going back to my neighbor’s backyard gate. Then you could see how the dirt was moved, indicating something was dragged/pulled under the gate. I opened the gate, saw an egg shell, but no more “line” of feathers. But as I got towards the neighbor’s back fence, I saw a mess of feathers in an area. At this point in the back fence there’s an obvious area under the fence that something can squeeze under, and sure enough there were more feathers on the other side of the fence… off into the greenbelt.

So as far as I can tell, Nessie was attacked, dragged off, and eaten last night. 😦

Of course, this is life, this is nature. Kids understand that, but it’s still a sad day as Nessie has been around for quite a while and been a dedicated mother. Plus now the kids wonder about the nest of eggs… will another duck adopt them? We actually have a second nest from another hen also at the house and we’re thinking about moving the eggs to her nest. We’ll see. Still to be determined.

The bigger question is…. what could have taken her?

This is where I’m requesting your help.

Raccoon? Maybe. Fox? Maybe. While my reading says they could take a duck, it’s unlikely they would. Muscovy’s are larger ducks. They have claws in their feet (they are perching ducks). They can make noise and put up a fight. These are not the sort of targets for a raccoon or a fox, especially when there’s a ton of eggs for easy pickings.

Possum? No.

So… what? Could it be a coyote? Possible. We do hear them howling every so often, but haven’t in some time.

Bobcat? That’s my father-in-law’s guess.

If that’s the case, I’m not happy about that. I don’t need a bobcat around.

I have a game camera. I’m going to set it up. Maybe too late for that, but my hope is whatever it was will know this is a spot with food and will come back within the week to try again. Hopefully I’ll catch something on film.

Updated: Game camera set. We’ll see if it turns up anything.

The area under the fence gate measures about 4″. Not a problem for some things to wiggle through.

Went looking in the greenbelt for more traces. Oldest found something that looks like scat and could be bobcat scat, but we aren’t 100% sure.

Present signs are pointing to a bobcat. Just what I need….