The ducklings are now almost the size of Honey, and since she’s now molting and has shed most of her primary feathers, it’s hard to tell her apart from her brood. The other development is that the “babies” are now testing out their wings, sitting on the duck island and flapping them furiously for long periods. They aren’t feathered enough to fly yet, but their primaries are growing in, and I think they’re exercising their wing muscles. This must be instinctive, for surely they don’t know they can fly. What a sensation it must be for a duck to take off for the first time! I can’t imagine—and we’ll never know—what that feels like to them. And how marvelous that at some point, they’ll just flap and take off!
Here are the wing feathers, by the way:
Here’s Honey, and you can see that her big primaries, which used to cross over each other by her tail, are gone:
Honey (right) with three of her brood. They’re about as big as she is now, and only her white-ish tail and beak mottling, as well as her position (standing guard, swimming either in front of or behind the ducklings) are obvious identifiers.
In contrast to Honey, her brood are growing in their primary feathers, which you can see in these photos of a duckling foraging in the lily pads:
Notice the big honking wing feathers starting to impinge on the tail:
The gang gathered for breakfast this morning. Can you spot Mom? Note the turtle at upper left along with a feather floating by it. The duck at the extreme right has its beak open.
Lord help me, I’m getting soft, collecting Honey’s shed feathers that are floating in the pond. The middle two are blue and must be part of her speculum:
A close-up of what I think is a speculum feather with a white tip and an iridescent blue half:
Time to start photographing the nine beaks soon?
See if the markings change much – though the duckling beaks look similarly blank so perhaps not
Isn’t Mom’s neck considerably longer than the chicks’? Seem like she stands about 1/2″ taller.
I’d like to see a video of the young ducks furiously flapping. It is interesting to think of the sensation they might have when they go from just flapping furiously to starting to lift off the ground.
It’s lovely to see how the ducklings grow and change over time. And they all look so healthy and happy! That’s down to you Jerry, making the effort every day, even when you’re not well.
If you collect enough feathers, you can try to create a replica of Honey out of them.
You will need to go out to the pet store and get some small weights for them to work out on. Build up for flying.
Anates felix!
I totally get it, your collecting of Honey’s feathers! I’d be inclined to do that too, if my ducks stuck around all summer. Late spring, they flew off to the nearby creek to nest, once the neighbour’s cat claimed our backyard for his chill out spa. He’s a bird hunter and mouser.
I thought of collecting the feathers as soon as you mentioned seeing them in the water, before I read that you are doing just that. [I have an envelope full of the shed whiskers of our dear departed Gus. Funny sentimental monkeys, aren’t we?]
Ducks are so much more refreshing than politicians!
If only Trump were a duck. Think we can trade him for one?!
Duck al orange, perhaps?
😀
A couple of weeks of force-feeding and he would give a huge foie gras.
He looks like he doesn’t need any extra feeding. (Sorry for my weightism, just cannot resist.)
Do ducks do what corvids do in hot weather: sit around with their mouths open?