Sunday, June 09, 2013

A Mother Wood Duck and her Babies

Yesterday, while crossing  the highway bridge I thought I had glimpsed a large bird sitting on a rock in the river.  I asked my husband to turn and go back so that I could check it out.  It was raining as I hurried down a slope to an observation deck overlooking the rive there.  I didn't see any large bird but I did see a duck with a few little ducklings swimming behind it as they swam around a large rock in the river there. Perhaps it had been the Mother Duck perched on the rock that I had glimpsed when crossing the bridge above it.  I was delighted with such a find!  And although it was raining I didn't care.  I continued snapping pictures of this beautiful duck family and as I watched the mother  duck shepherd her family safely to shore and  I sensed my husband had the same shepherding instincts as he beckoned me to return to  the waiting truck.  As I have titled my blog 'Nature Tales and Camera Trails':I will tell the story of this duck family with the pictures I was able to get . As soon as I had downloaded the photos I could see by the distinctive white eye of the female that it was a Wood Duck.

The first sighting I had of the female Wood Duck was of her and a few of her babies rounding a rock in the river
Once she was around the rock I could see that she had a sizable family swimming along behind her.
It might be a little difficult to count but she has eight baby ducks accompanying her!


Rest well Mama Duck!  May you and your babies fare well in the coming days!

3 comments:

eileeninmd said...

The wood ducks are awesome! Great sighting of the family, love the ducklings.

Pamela Gordon said...

That is so cute. So many babies!

~Kim at Golden Pines~ said...

How sweet! I hope they stay safe too--Sometimes I wonder what the Mom's are thinking sometimes when I see them in these off the wall places!