Althouse: Ducklings — paddling and scampering.

May 29, 2025

Ducklings — paddling and scampering.

Today, on Lake Mendota:

20 comments:

Nancy said...: Thanks Althouse! That made my day!
I sometimes think I'd like to be a duck, so I could swim and walk and fly. But none of them very well.; 5/29/25, 5:08 PM
tcrosse said...: On the south shore of Lake Harriet, in Minneapolis, there was a flock of ducks. Among them there was an all-white barnyard duck. I always wondered how it escaped and joined the wild flock.; 5/29/25, 5:28 PM
Smilin' Jack said...: In the old days there were a lot more ducks on Mendota, because people were encouraged to feed them—the Union sold packets of duck food you could toss to them from the lakefront. But there got to be too many ducks for their own good, so that was stopped. Wonder when God will stop feeding us…; 5/29/25, 5:40 PM
BUMBLE BEE said...: On a road next to a beachfront I spied something ahead moving across the pavement.
A straight but wiggling line of about six ducklings and mama bringing up the rear.; 5/29/25, 6:00 PM
RCOCEAN II said...: Cute ducks. Great video.; 5/29/25, 6:05 PM
Narr said...: Be kind to your flat-footed friends.; 5/29/25, 6:08 PM
Bob Boyd said...: One of them is Phil Robertson reincarnated.; 5/29/25, 6:37 PM
Smilin' Jack said...: Once when I was driving—in New Mexico I think it was—I rounded a curve just as a mother duck was leading her ducklings single file across the highway. No chance to stop; I just heard some thumps under the car and in the rearview saw the mother duck looking back at the remains of her brood. Nothing I could have done, but I still feel guilty.; 5/29/25, 6:43 PM
Dude1394 said...: Ducklings are too cute for words.; 5/29/25, 6:45 PM
n.n said...: Duck dynasty.; 5/29/25, 6:51 PM
Jaq said...: I have a rule, it's "never count the ducklings." And I have a saying, "If they all made it, the world would be paved with ducks." I was on a walk in Florida, near a canal and there was a momma duck and her babies, and they were being stalked by a heron. That was very weird to me, I had never seen that behavior in a heron before, but then I thought, who doesn't like a little variety in their diet?; 5/29/25, 7:48 PM
Jaq said...: There is a road in Vermont that drives on a causeway through a field of wild rice and other swampiness, and along the road you see this time of year Canada geese sitting on the shoulder of the highway in the grass, with little broods of geese. You can't fix stupid.; 5/29/25, 7:50 PM
Breezy said...: Nothing better than a day at the beach…. !; 5/29/25, 7:55 PM
Breezy said...: I used to think Herons just hunted fish. Nope. It’s surprising how diverse their palate is for a live catch….; 5/29/25, 8:00 PM
Rusty said...: That's why they make so many of them, Jack. We're the top tier predator a percentage of that brood was going to die whether you ran them over or not. 30 - 50% survive.; 5/29/25, 8:25 PM
Peachy said...: fantastic, thanks.; 5/29/25, 8:58 PM
Quaestor said...: "Nothing I could have done, but I still feel guilty."

Once upon a road I hit a mallard drake, not with my wheels, but with my front grillwork. The drake and his wife flew directly across my path from right to left. The duck made it across the road safely, but not the drake. I stopped and looked back. The drake was in the road, apparently stunned. I picked him up and took him home with me. I was determined to help him recover. Unfortunately, he could not raise himself to stand on his feet. Nor did he eat. Within 36 hours the poor thing died. I roasted the carcass and fed it to my Irish wolfhound. While plucking the feathers, I discovered a compound fracture of the spine hidden under the plumage. Doomed from the instant of impact, alas.; 5/29/25, 9:41 PM
BudBrown said...: Wikipedia has an interesting post on Peking duck. Starts "Peking duck is a dish from Beijing[a] that has been prepared since the Imperial era. So why dont we call it Beijing duck?
By the way, it was a Kissinger fav.; 5/30/25, 5:43 AM
michaele said...: Beautiful visuals and lapping water on shore sounds. The water looks so clean and clear.; 5/30/25, 6:34 AM
Narr said...: IIRC, "Peking" was chosen by a 19th C Brit scholar of China (and loon) who transliterated the Chinese sounds arbitrarily. In his system, Pe was supposed to be pronounced Bei, and King pronounced as Jing.

So Peking = Beijing but only if you read the fine print.; 5/30/25, 11:30 AM