It is only natural for ducks to plunge into a body water for a quick swim while flying to their breeding grounds. This shouldn’t be a big deal. After all, who wouldn’t want cute ducks swimming in their backyard? But this can quickly escalate from cute to annoying after seeing how the ducks shamelessly soil your swimming pool with their droppings, as they do in natural water bodies. As if that’s not bad enough, after swimming the ducks … [Read more...]
That Bird Has Angel Wing
When you see it, you may think that the twisted wing on a goose or a duck is injured or broken. But it’s not broken, and it is not an injury; it is a deformity called “angel wing” and there is nothing angelic about it. What is angel wing? Angel wing is a debilitating condition for waterfowl and is directly caused by human feeding. When young, growing birds are fed high carbohydrate foods such as bread and popcorn (which replace the … [Read more...]
Duck Nests in the Darnedest Places
Ducks, especially mallards, are quite at home in urban areas and add a sense of wild tranquility to our cities’ ponds, creeks and man-made bodies of water. As a species, they are somewhat new to urban areas and sometimes mistakenly view green roofs, planters, terraces, balconies, and enclosed courtyards as suitable places to nest. While this behavior may seem strange to us, mother ducks are programmed to only consider the nest site itself and its … [Read more...]