Sir, Who owns the ducks on Romney Park?

There appears far too many drakes terrorising the odd female duck at this time of the year.

The other day while walking along the footpath opposite the park I noticed seven or eight drakes surrounding a female duck and her ten ducklings. They seemed menacing to her and to get them away from her young she flew up the river with the drakes in hot pursuit.

Half an hour later I was walking back and could see the ten baby ducklings still on their own and thought that was worrying as they wouldn't last long without their mum.

Further upstream I saw drakes pecking at a female duck. She was well and truly dead with her head flopped in the water and the back of her neck was a gaping hole where she had been pecked. She gently floated past her baby ducklings.

On another day I saw a dead female duck floating down the river with her back all raw from pecking. I tried to rescue a female duck from the thuggish drakes one day. She was at the base of a wall on the riverbed but had found a dry patch on the side of the river as she seemed to know to keep off the water.

Her back was a mass of open wounds, she was trembling with fear and the eight or so bullies persistently pecking her.

There are far too many drakes on the river. They seem to have no purpose other than to terrorise the females and each other. They do not defend their females when she is nesting, they do not protect their young.

There should be a serious cull to get rid of these bully boys.

Jane Ritchie Kendal