The summer’s warm weather has allowed me to spend many a night sitting on the deck at my small, high glass topped table, watching the evening light slowly sink to sunset. Occasionally the local loon floats by and often its lovely call echoes down the lake.
One such recent evening, the quiet was interrupted by loud squawks. I looked up from the book I was reading. What was disturbing my peace and quiet? The squawks got louder. Water splashed. Wings flapped. I set my book aside and headed down to the lake to investigate.
Swimming around the dock were two mother ducks and a flock of ducklings. At first, I figured they were one large happy fowl family, but that shows how naïve I was. Seems I was witnessing more of a duck gang-fight.
One mother reared up and zipping quickly across the water attacked the other! Not satisfied she changed her target and charged two ducklings nearest the attacked mother. I wondered if I was going to be a bystander to an all-out duck war, but the victimized duck took off, followed by her offspring, probably to a safe haven at our neighbors to the west.
Seemingly satisfied with her success, the nasty mother duck gathered up the remaining seven little ducklings and headed east along the shore.
This all happened several weeks ago. Since then I’ve been throwing out stale bread crumbs, and both duck families have visited, but never together again. The larger family has remained intact, but the mother with two ducklings frequently stops by and unfortunately is down to one.
A villain has been added to the drama— the neighborhood eagle. It flies along the shoreline and sits on the top of a tall pine keeping a sharp eye out for a meal. One evening as Dick puttered around the dock, the mother and her lone surviving baby paddled about, picking up bread crumbs. Suddenly she vanished, and he looked up to see the eagle perched atop a nearby tall pine. We did not see the duck family again that evening.
As of this writing, the number of young ducklings has stayed the same. I’m crossing my fingers.
Watermelon update! My daughter informed me that she’d hoped my last column about choosing good watermelons would give her some good tips, but it hadn’t. Since then, the last three watermelons I picked out have been wonderful. I credit the “splotch” method. They have all had creamy yellow spots the size of a small fist left by a ripened vine. I promise to keep readers posted.
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