Patent ID: 8238344

Claim:
A method comprising: receiving, at a network device, a first packet and a second packet, the first packet and the second packet to be multicast to a plurality of destination nodes that include a first destination and a second destination, the first destination being associated with a first port of the network device, and the second destination being associated with an aggregated interface that includes: a second port, of the network device, that differs from the first port, and a third port, of the network device, that differs from the first port and the second port; multicasting, by the network device, the first packet to the plurality of destination nodes using a first multicast forwarding table, the first multicast forwarding table including routing information associated with the first port and the second port not including routing information associated with the third port; multicasting, by the network device, the second packet to the plurality of destination nodes using a second multicast forwarding table, the second multicast forwarding table including routing information associated with the first port and the third port and not including routing information associated with the second port; receiving a third packet to be multicast to the plurality of destination nodes; and multicasting the third packet using a randomly selected one of the first multicast forwarding table or the second multicast forwarding table.