Ducks Visit the Backyard

A pair of mallards visited our backyard this morning. The male stood in the middle of the lawn while the female strolled down the garden path, presumably in search of a nice pond to call their own. Were they checking out nesting options? If so, I can't imagine they were pleased. The only standing water is the fillable-spillable tub that catches water from the downspout.

The most appealing interpretation of their surprise visit is that one of them might have been born here five years ago, back when through the luck of the draw we ended upt with a pair of mallards among our fine feathered pets in the backyard. Being a male and female, they soon had five ducklings to call their own. As the ducklings grew, the yard seemed to shrink, overfilled as it now was with ducks and chickens. There were times when we'd hear the nasal call of geese flying overhead, or one or another duck would fly in an impressive arc around the boundaries of the yard, and I'd think for sure they would respond to the call of the wild and venture off into the big world beyond our fenceline. But they never did.

The mallard family eventually ended up at a farm outside of town, whose owners were kind enough to take them off our hands. I read that mallards live 5-10 years in the wild. How lovely to think that they might have come back to have a look around at their old haunts.

For some posts about the ducks we had behind our house on busy Harrison Street, type the word "mallard" into the search box for this blog, or follow this link.