a little duck tail

Walking back from getting a free Italian ice at Rita's (they give it away free on the first day of Spring) I noticed this duck, walking fast across their path.

I suspected something was about to happen.

 He stopped for a moment when he noticed me.

You can tell by the waters disturbance he is swimming quickly. Notice the pair of ducks ahead. He heads right for them.

I was momentarily distracted, but when I looked back the duck had chased his prey, a pretty little female mallard back near the path. As she got to land, he grabbed her by the feathers on the back of her neck and dragged her into the water.

He repositioned his bill to the back of her head as he mounted her.

 She struggled.

 So he forces her head below the waters surface to make her compliant to his desire.

 Her head breaks the surface as he rolls off her back.

 She tries to shake it off like a bad dream.

 oh the shame of it all

 Here he comes again, as if to say, "Look! I put my head under the water and it doesn't bother me!"

 "Gonna wash that mallard right out of my hair, errr, feathers!"

 Giving one last good shake all the way back to her tail.

The End

duck fight!

Somewhere I went wrong yesterday in my assessment of the ducks.  Guess they were up for one last hurrah, of sorts.

There was one female that I thought was a single. But I watched as she went first with one other male, then went over to Blue Eyes. (she's still with him today so I assume it is his original mate) One of the new arrivals, I think I mentioned he had a lot of battle scars, then went towards the female.

Blue Eyes went immediately on the attack.

I wish I could identify each female duck, but they are a little tougher to differentiate some times.  Was this really BE's mate? Or was a this a second go around? 
I just looked out and they are at it again. Only two females remain the rest have been gone for at least two days.

One thing that I observe is that the females never get upset by the fighting. They go about their business and appear unconcerned that there's a life and death struggle, often just inches from them! 

You can see how they use every part of their body in a fight, including their tail.

The first half of the video doesn't have sound, it was taken inside. The second part I was outside and much closer. They were oblivious to my presence.

I think he was even giving me the evil eye!

Here she is ready to take off (and he will follow)

They go through quite a range of gyrations before taking off that still photos can't show. Here she has her head & neck stretched high. They do a lot of head bobbing right before taking flight also. Which is funny looking when there's a group getting ready to take off together.

 just before take off she hunkers down.

 and we have lift off

With all they go through, it's then amazing to see them take off in when afraid or startled.   Mallards are not graceful, nor careful  More then once I feared being smacked in the head by a duck taking off in the yard.  I see them often crashing into big tree branches on take off.  But they are sturdy little creatures and this doesn't seem to cause them too much harm.

Bob has a roomie

Yesterday I noticed under the feeding station, not only the hole Bob had been using, but holes all around the base.  Odd I thought.

Looking out the window today I saw a little nose sticking out of the hole where Bob was last seen. Imagine my surprise when it wasn't Bob but a meadow mouse (some call it a meadow vole)

so where's Bob I wondered? Does he know someone is living there? I hadn't seen Bob because of the cold and wet weather for a couple days so maybe someone took over while he was safely under ground.

A little while later I look out and see Bob!

I startled Bob and he ran back to the rocks for a few moments, then made a mad dash under the feeder station, through one hole and straight out to the other side. 
I'd love to lift up the base of that feeder station and see if I can figure out what goes on under there!  As Sister pointed out, they may share exit/entrances, but they may actually have separate burrows. Well I want to see!  But I'll resist...for now!

Tomorrow I'll show you how I wasn't exactly right about the ducks.  There's still some drama going on out there!

time for nesting!

The duck fights, for the most part had subsided by the end of last week. An occasional chase but no more of the ferocious attacks.  Some of the ducks had departed and what has been left this past week are 4 pair and one single duck.  The single male mallard is the one with the most fight scars, you can see some of them as the white areas, where feathers have been pulled out by his attackers, on his brown 'bib'.  he also has a bit of a dent in the back of his head. I assume that is also just missing feathers.

He does follow the other couples around. Every hopeful I guess. But when the other males get tired of it and turn towards him, he no longer takes a fight stance, instead he swims quickly away.

The paired ducks look so sweet together don't they?  The males are very attentive.  When they come to the yard for feed, the males often stand guard, letting the female eat first.

Here is Blue Eyes with his mate.

While her mate was busy grooming, this female wandered off.

 Here's her mate, hurrying to catch up to her.

Two days ago I looked out and there was one of the males all by himself. So I quickly looked around to see if I could see where his female mate had gotten. I almost didn't see her. She was up on the bank across the stream. It was a struggle for her to get down and slid in the dirt.  She may have been looking for a nesting site.

This morning I came home and noticed right away a collection of male mallards at the corner of the stream.  So nesting time is upon us. The girls are gone and the males are left to their own devices. From past years I know the routine...the males will be bored. They will sleep a lot on the banks. This is also  their time to molt, shedding some of their more brilliant mating plumage, as the females will also molt while they are away.

 More males will join the other males here.  Any single female that shows up will be subjected to non-consensual mating. It can get really ugly. We are talking duck rape here. Not just my term, that's the way it is described on several websites.  But if you have ever witnessed it, you would have to agree.  Males may also try mating with other males. 

 It's a wild world out there!

The mallards aren't the only ones in season.  it's become more noticeable with turning our clocks back, daylight lasting later the birds are more active now not just in the mornings, but in the early evenings too.  I had to go out and find the bird that was singing. I'm not too familiar with bird calls or songs. But the song was pretty and I needed to know what bird sang it. 

Here is the female cardinal I found singing her pretty song. I read that the black mask is one indicator mates look at before choosing. Apparently it gives sign of their condition. Females with a large face mask are thought to be good nest defenders, but in a male a big face mask means they aren't as successful in reproduction.  So size matters. To them.

It was interesting to watch this male come closer as the female sang. Notice they are looking away from each other. Ah the ritual of non-chalance. Apparently don't want to show too much interest too fast.  Does this sound familiar? :D 

Another male cardinal flew into a nearby tree. Shortly another female followed.  But when the singing cardinal flew off, both cardinals gave chase. I felt bad for the left out female!

 another cardinal photo, with his feathers fluffed up from the wind.

The mourning doves are a hoot to watch.  The males are persistent to the point of being obnoxious. I think mother nature made the male so much bulkier to give the female a chance to flee unwanted attention. LOL

Run girl run!

A song sparrow on the rocks.

There's a wren in my bowl! Gathering up a striped sunflower seed

Every morning I've seen or heard large flocks of geese making their way north.

One of the daily small planes that fly over.  I've been hearing the airport setting off whistling fire crackers on a regular basis lately. They set them off when there is a plane coming in. The geese like to congregate on their large expanse of grass.  The only problem is it scares off the birds in my yard too. 

The squirrel was raiding the peanut butter feeder and inadvertently knocked down a sunflower feeder.  Lucky squirrel! He started chewing apart the small openings, but then found if he simply rolled the feeder around he was rewarded with seed.

A robin,  singing.

The dark eyed junco is still here. Though today the number seems smaller. The weather is to warm up significantly on Friday, so I don't expect to see them much longer.  When they leave and the catbirds show up, I'll be confident that Spring is really here.

Yesterday while I was out looking to see what birds were singing, I heard a woodpecker drumming. It was loud.  It took me awhile to find her. I'm pretty sure she kept changing spots because I found on right on the tree out front, almost above where I was standing!  I went in to get my camera, but she was gone till I got back. But what I found surprised me.

This isn't visible from the house side of the tree. I'm not sure what to make of it. I've looked it up online and there could be several causes for the bark to be like this. And it's not from the woodpecker. At least not alone. The squirrels may possibly be responsible.  While some trees do lose their bark at times naturally, that's usually on the trunk.

I looked around and noticed a lot of things going on with the trees. 

A tree on the bank I knew was favored by the woodpeckers. But I was really surprised to find the bark falling off the tree. I examined a piece of bark trying to discern whether this is only woodpecker problems or a problem of the bugs they are getting out of the tree.  Like what came first the chicken or the egg!? Though for this particular tree it's not important. It's a scrub tree and out of the way. Happy pecking woodpeckers, you get those bugs!

This is the mulberry tree. The damage to the branches on this is definately from the birds and squirrels. You can see the girdling affect, where there is bark missing the whole way around the branch.

The real irony is that I just read a blog of another woman who has a tree issue and had a recommendation to cut it down.

Look what I found!  This is Autumn Joy Sedum that I had split apart and transplanted last fall. So far it's the only one I notice coming up, but it's early yet, right?

next post, Bob has a visitor.

First let me say, my heart goes out to those in Japan.  I tend to immerse myself in the news during big news events like this.  Watching the footage and stills of a devastated land make ones heart break. 

But it also makes me appreciate the simple things in life all the more, and I regret less the time I spend simply watching out the window at what nature is providing outside.   Taking trips outside to see how things are budding, the crocus that are appearing, ever so slowly.  The daffodils getting ready to open (though they seem shorter this year!)  Watching all the animals as they prepare for Spring, pairing up, making nests.  Hard to imagine being without natures beauty and being forced into survival mode, being without the very basics of survival without knowing when you will have a place, a bed of your own, your own garden.  Forces you to think of all the possibilities in your own life. Here it's floods, airports, TMI.  Of course there's been a lot of TMI references the past few days.

Anyhow, speaking of floods, we had a small flood here over the past week.  What was bad was all the dire predictions, with levels that would have been slightly higher then Ivan.  So I had moved a lot of stuff from the yard, took my 3 house bunnies to stay with my mom, etc.  For days the news was full of 'flood talk'.  It turned out to be a non-event.  Don't get me wrong - that is a good thing. But in time, if they continue to get it wrong, people will stop listening. Makes me think of the boy who cried wolf.  When the big one hits, many won't be prepared.  I'll probably be one of them :D 

I was concerned about Bob with all the rain we got. It appears that Bob is getting smarter with each instance of torrential rain. First he stays underground until conditions improve.  Talk about being prepared!  Those few days of quickly collecting all the food he can, pays off!  I knew I was going to see him again when I saw a new opening, finally, UNDER a plant.  Good job Bob! Now he seems to have a few holes open.  When I first saw him reappear, he was popping out from under the base of the feeder station. 

You can see the opening to his left.  Pretty smart, puts him right at a food source!

Here's the burrow I mentioned the last time, that has been revampedmore rock and dirt removed.  I assume by a groundhog, since that's what created it in the first place.  But as the waters were rising the other day, I saw the muskrat enter it, taking a brief break from the rain and fast moving water. He didn't stay long, so I'm wondering if there was a groundhog in there and he thought it best not to stay.

This blue heron has been visiting more frequently, despite the heavy rains. Perhaps because of them?

Notice he pulled his head in once he realized I was watching him.  He took off shortly afterwards.

My small stream looking more like a river.

A very flooded duck path.

Today seems to be one of those days when I have the attention span of a gnat.  Tomorrow it's to rain again, and hopefully I'll be more focused and I can share some of the great things going on outside, with the ducks and other birds in particular, as their focus has changed from winter survival, to mating!

Quick! Before I forget!

As I've mentioned, this rock pile is very popular with Bob the chipmunk, but it is  favored among the small birds, particularly those that feed often on the ground.

When the birds are feeding on the ground and feel threatened, instead of flying up and across the stream to hide in the brush/trees, it's a shorter, safer trip to stay low and zoom to the rocks. And apparently it's a great place to perch and look around, without all the trees and brush obscuring their view.

Now if I ever get the permit to work on the stream, I'll feel guilty about taking their rock pile away, since it's intended use is IN the stream. These rock/stone comes from an old farmhouse that was torn down late last fall. My (crazy) neighbor asked if I wanted some and who can refuse free rock! He has it piled all over his yard, around all his plants. Rocks and bricks everywhere!

But really who knew what an asset this would be to so many critters on my yard!  So if you have some space, create a rock pile and see who visits. Once it warms up, I wonder if I'll get to see any snakes sunning themselves on the rocks!

Half my readers just went ohhhh and the other half went ACKKK!  What side are you on?!?

have a great night!

PS does anyone have a difficult time reading this with the change of colors and layout?