Danielle Blog

Feathered Friend Friday

The other night, HB called me upstairs to our dining room level because “There are DUCKS in the yard!”

I hurriedly grabbed my camera and sure enough, they were checking out the neighbor’s hot tub.

You can barely see them between the two trees in that photo. Here is a close-up of the same shot.

It was dusk and hence the lighting was dim, but what you’ll see there is the male mallard in the center and the female just behind him.

They hung around for a little while. And then another bird swooped down and scared them, and they flew off toward the lake. I figured that was the last I’d see of the ducks until I went on my next walk around the lake where I tend to see lots of ducks and geese.

But I was mistaken! The next morning, the female was checking out the neighbor’s front yard and then our front yard!

She was hopping up onto the stones surrounding the landscaping and was touring through the landscaping. Then she’d hop down and check out the next section of landscaping.

I started to realize that this wasn’t just some blind search for bugs or food, this was a search for a nesting site!

She was clearly leading the search and was wasting no time going from spot to spot.

I call that photo, “female duck – trekking on”.

Eventually, I realized the male was following her. But our yard must not have been conducive to nesting, because they left.

Note in that photo, although the male shows up the best, the female is in it too.

At first I was disappointed that they didn’t choose our yard for nesting, but then I started thinking about how before too long, we are going to have to mow and weed eat. And that wouldn’t exactly be the type of activities that Mama Duck would want to have going on near her nest. So, it is probably just as well that they went somewhere else.

But it was still fun while it lasted.

Note in these photos there was a glare on the window, hence the foggy appearance of some of them.