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Subject:

Ducks and muck Davidsonville Park

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Joanne Howl

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Wed, 29 Apr 2009 00:18:37 -0400

 

This evening I took a walk in Davidsonville park.   It was a quiet night for birds – but there were a few worth mentioning.   

 

The first highlight was a family of KILLDEER – with four downy young.  They were in a field being used to play Little League.   They were in far, far, far outfield and were safe – but one precocious young bird seemed pretty curious to see what those “big birds” were doing way out there in their field.  The two adults called and flew in front of their child, seemed successful at turning him and headed further out-field.

 

I decided to follow a far path that paralleled the river.  The path nearly ended at the woods where it met the river. There a male WOOD DUCK took off, vocalizing, as did a GREAT BLUE HERON.    In a few minutes the female WOOD DUCK swam into view – trailed by about seven (maybe more) tiny, dark little downy young!  She saw me, peeped frantically and herded them out of the water and onto the bank.  They made a bunch of tiny peeps and I could see them scurrying, then all was still.  Thinking they were gone, I started down the almost-invisible path – apparently close to where they’d hidden themselves.  Mother duck hustled them into the river on the other side of the bank, where the water had a swift current next to the far shore.  She headed them upriver on the quiet side – then flew away
 noisily.  One duckling hit the current – and started to be carried away.  Visions of diving in to save him started dancing in my head (oh no not ANOTHER duckling to bring home!) – but thankfully – VERY thankfully – he gave a little duckling blast of energy, broke free of the current and caught up with his siblings.  

 

As they disappeared upstream, I turned to start up the trail, again – and there, exposed on a low branch of a bush not 8 feet in front of me was a startling bright PROTHONOTARY WARBLER.  The woods were dull, but he was illuminated – just gorgeous!  He sat completely still and completely silent a few long moments, head tilted as if watching, then suddenly flitted away.  It was kind of a magic moment. 

 

As good as those birds were, I’m not sure I’d recommend the path beyond – it was fabulous for awhile, but it ended in a swampy, mucky yuck – where I lost both of my shoes!  Yeah, I waded back into the muck, halfway up to my knees, and wrestled them free. (shoes are too hard to come by these days to give to the swamp-gods!)  It was pretty darn funny, until I realized that I had to carry the shoes plus about five pounds of stinking muck stuck to them all the way through the woods, past the playing fields (full of people) and all the way to my car.  All in my mud-caked socks. 

 

 Can you believe that a couple of very thin,20blonde women sitting in a shiny silver BMW pointed at me and giggled?  Huh?  What was that about?  Haven’t they seen a mud-covered middle aged woman, with binoculars hanging from her neck and carrying chunky mucky shoes, walking the parking lot before?   What could they possibly have to giggle at ?  (to their credit, they politely turned their head, stifled the giggle and didn’t actually guffaw until they were nearly – but not quite - entirely out of sight). 

 

Well, I saw and experienced something they never would … and I had a great time getting entirely southern-maryland swamp gunky.  Would I trade that experience for that shiny BMW?  Uh………… well….. … I … uh…. um ….  is anyone offering?   

 

By the way, for those who read about my orphaned Easter Duckling – the kids have dubbed it Cheese N. Quackers.  (N stands for Nippy).  It is growing and is doing okay.  Ducks truly are filthy creatures… but that’s another story.  

 

Joanne  (aka Swamp Mamma)

 

Joanne Howl, DVM

West River, MD