Driving home from work on a rainy spring evening, I came across this scene at a favourite marsh. The rain had drizzled to a stop and the setting sun squeaked through the cloud cover to light up the steamy nesting site of the redwings.
Someday … Normally, if the mother mallard suspects that I might be in my island blind, she keeps her distance. She will feed her chicks around the perimeter and swim past freely but she would never land anywhere near the blind. But this season, I think mom was a repeat customer. Ducks pretty much all look the same but when I checked previous year’s photos it looked like she had similar markings. And I believe she knew she’d be safer near us in case of predators. Indeed, we’d rushed out several times in past seasons to scare away minks and others while she squawked and stood her ground against them. And we’d already had several such interventions this year. So here they were, landing right next to me and actually snuggling in together for a short siesta less than 20 feet away. And as they were jockeying for position around mom, this little one came wondering over to me, and with a far away look in his eye, rose up and flapped his little wings. Looked like he was dreaming of future flights. Then he wobbled back and took a nap.
I spent the better part of May sunsets haunting a marsh along my route home from work. I originally attempted to get mostly red-winged blackbirds flying among the cattails but I’m a cheap date and pretty soon was shooting anything that moved. The grackles were great. They’re not as “popular” as red wings but were a bit slower which helped in my effort to get long sequences of flight.
