This morning Lu Ann (one of our accounting gurus) comes in asking, “Did you see the duck?”
“No,” I replied, “where?”
We went outside Lehman’s office and warehouse on the north side among some of the bushes in the mulch, and there she was. This Mallard decided to nest right outside the door of the business that shares our building. Somebody put out a small container of water to keep Mom comfortable.
Seems our building is a popular nesting location for some of our local flying friends. Just last year we had some Killdeer nesting in the rocks at the edge of our parking lot. I know there are some more out there this spring, as one was trying to scare me off the other morning.
The Mallard did eyeball me as I snapped these photos, but didn’t seem to mind posing. She did get a bit more excited as I got closer, and settled back down as I moved away.
She will not show us her eggs, but we assume they are doing fine. Hopefully we will be around to see the young ones, but that is up to mom. Hopefully it will be a happy Mother’s Day for this new Mom. We will keep you posted.
UPDATE:
Somebody was nice enough to put out food for Duck. Apparently she has been getting up from time to time getting some water.
Mother duck will wet her feathers everyday by a water source even dewy/wet grass. This maintains the humidity needed to mature and hatch her babies.
Today our female goose started hatching her egg clutch. Since we only have “Goosey” – we had replaced her sterile eggs with hopefully fertile duck eggs. So far she has 3 “Ducgooslings”
I love ducks!! How wonderful to have a wild one nesting near you!