Feeding ducks bread at the park is a classic scene. While it’s always the best intentions that lead people to bring leftover bread to share a meal with the endearing creatures, the practice results in serious health complications that could cost the animals their lives.
Long-term damage
Jordan Ojah, a certified wildlife rehabilitator at Wildlife Haven, outlines the syndrome (called angel wing) that results from feeding bread to waterfowl:
“Angel wing happens when they are given an improper diet and their bones form misaligned. Their bones form kind of twisted. Instead of being able to flap their wings, their bones are sticking out[wards],” she says. “It's not necessarily painful, but it is a result of malnutrition, which can often happen when people are feeding animals things like bread or breadcrumbs or just things that they normally would not be able to find in the wild. It's not nutritious to them at all.”
Trapped in the cold
The main concern with angel wing is that the complication prevents the waterfowl from flying south for the colder months. The trapped animals cannot survive the frigid temperatures. This was the concern for the Wildlife Rehabilitation Centre’s recent rescue of a mallard from Altona’s Buffalo Creek Nature Pond.
The Rehabilitation Centre got a tip that there was a duck on the pond that appeared unable to leave it.
“We knew that the duck was not capable of flying and so we knew it wouldn't be able to migrate down south for the winter,” says Oja. “It had injuries that were consistent with angel wing.”
After an all-hands-on-deck rescue of the mallard in Altona, it was determined that the bird did not have angel wing, but rather a broken wing. Even so, Ojah says that angel wing syndrome is an increasing issue in the region.
“We have an influx of cases at the hospital every single fall of angel wing and we have to do many rescues every year because these ducks are just not able to leave the areas that they're in,” she says. “It takes a lot of team effort. It takes a lot of resources and a lot of help from the public, actually.”
Ojah says that unless a case of angel wing is caught early in a bird’s life when its bones are still forming, it is not reversible. This means that waterfowl diagnosed with the condition are most often euthanized.
Starving to death
In addition to angel wing, waterfowl are also at risk of crop impaction when they are fed improper foods. The crop, which is a pouch in a bird’s throat that functions as a part of the digestive system, can become blocked. The blockage prevents the animal from eating, which results in painstaking starvation.
“They're just fed these things like bread . . . that they eat and eat and eat and then it expands in their crop, but they're not able to digest it,” says Ojah. “These poor ducks and geese are essentially starving to death because they're not able to process the food that they've been given.”
What should we feed waterfowl?
While Ojah has compassion for those who have the impulse to feed ducks and geese, she emphasizes that it is not what’s best for the animals.
“I know it's very fun for kids to go and feed them bread and watch them peck around at it, but it's not nutritious at all for them and it causes these injuries,” she says.
If feeding bread to ducks and geese is dangerous to their health, what should we feed them?
The short answer: nothing.
According to Ducks Unlimited’s brief and clear article, it’s best not to feed waterfowl. The practice causes a dependency on humans for food, and the foods we have to share are often less nutritious than what the animals can source themselves.
Ojah agrees, but there’s no need to despair. Nature always finds a way to keep the waterfowl nourished.
“I know that a lot of times . . . people try their best to feed them healthier foods, but at the end of the day, I think that we should just let wild animals be wild,” she says.
While it is natural to want to share a meal with our fine feathered friends, it’s safest to settle for admiring their beauty without bringing any snacks to the park.