Shortly after the nice surprise of seeing a Wood Duck with two ducklings on Sunday I came upon this one with eight ducklings.
Female Wood Duck with Eight Ducklings
They were paddling along all together in a tight group at first but eventually spread out enough for me to count them.
Female Wood Duck with Eight Ducklings
They followed the pond to the corner then did an about face and headed back the way they came, sticking pretty close to mom. The water was reflecting the dead brown grass on the bank so this image isn’t that pretty, but you can see each duckling distinctly.
Small, compact and swimming at a steady pace, I thought this was a Grebe at first when I caught a glimpse through the reeds.
Female Bufflehead
I was able to get to a gap in the reeds for a better view and discovered it was a female Bufflehead. I listened and looked on both sides of the marsh dike where I was walking and didn’t see any others.
This Hooded Merganser was outnumbered, by Common Gallinules of all things. Gallinules tend to stick to the edges of any waterway and mind their own business except for their cackling squawks which always alerts the whole area to a photographer’s presence. Or so I thought.
Hooded Merganser and Gallinules
The Gallinules quickly got into the Merganser’s space.
Hooded Merganser and Gallinules
He tried out paddling them.
Hooded Merganser and Gallinules
They followed so the Merganser opted to put some extra distance between them.
Last Saturday was a spectacular bird day at Bear Island Wildlife Management Area and these Blue-winged Teals were one of the many groups of birds I saw. The water had been lowered in some of the back ponds which attracts the wading birds, shore birds and migrating ducks.
The reeds at the edge of the canals are above my head in most places so I did not have a clear view of the teals until they took off.
This is the first Whistling Duck I have seen in South Carolina. He was perched high in a tree over a pond and I couldn’t even tell what it was until I zoomed in on the image in my camera.
Black-bellied Whistling Duck in Tree
The duck periodically threw his head back and made a very un-duck like sounding call.
Black-bellied Whistling Duck in Tree
A pair of Black-bellied Whistling Ducks flew by, but didn’t slow down to listen to the one in the tree and he didn’t make any effort to join them.
Black-bellied Whistling Duck Pair Flying
There was still about a half hour until sunset, but the sun, which was behind me, was disappearing into a cloud bank, taking the light and any possibility of a colorful sunset with it.
A group of nine Wood Ducks were hanging out on an Alligator Ramp, preening and enjoying the late afternoon sun late last week.
Wood Ducks on Ramp
Nothing in particular seemed to have startled them, but by twos and threes they flew off.
Wood Ducks Flying Away from Ramp
As the ducks shifted around some flashes of blue were evident. Some of the adult males have lost their full breeding colors and the juvenile males are starting to show some color.
Wood Ducks Flying
One juvenile was left by herself, pacing up and down. She finally decided joining the pack was the right thing to do.
A mother Wood Duck usually stays with her ducklings until they are grown to near adult size, the “teen age” stage. The males are sometimes around but don’t seem to supervise the young the way I’ve seen the females herd their charges around.
Three Wood Duck Ducklings
No adult was in sight for these three ducklings and I suspect the mother became lunch for a predator. The survival rate for the ducklings is low and the adults can fall victim to alligators, hawks, or eagles. These three were sticking together, swimming around the pond to various perches. As plant eaters these ducklings don’t rely on the parent bringing food, they just eat what is around them.
Three Wood Duck Ducklings
This board they are settled on is an Alligator ramp that has been slowly sinking into the pond over the last year.
Three Wood Duck Ducklings
The surface of the pond is covered with a mixture of green Duck Weed and some variation of Mosquito Fern, the red plant. Zoom in on the closer image of the dragonfly perched on the surface to see the plants in more detail.
The oldest Wood Duck chicks on the pond right now are almost indistinguishable from their mothers.
Wood Duck Family
This old alligator platform gets smaller every week, either sinking or rotting into the pond. This small family squeezes together on it to groom and soak up the afternoon sun.
Wood Duck Family
From the end of the pond you get a view of the platform with the sun glaring off the duckweed. In silhouette you can see mother duck standing a little taller and with more head feathers than her four youngsters. She had turned just a bit to see which way I was headed.
