Just Ducky
"Be like a duck. Calm on the surface, but always paddling like the dickens underneath."
**Michael Caine
HANK: We've known each other for a while now, right? So you know about the ducks. I'd say—"our" ducks, but they're wild duck, mallards, so they don't belong to anyone but themselves. But they discovered us, our backyard pool at least, and every year—since gee, I bet 1997? They've arrived in the spring.
The crocuses come, and then the tulips, and then the ducks. Every year. (Jonathan took this nice photo Sunday.)
We have a (not glamorous) swimming pool in our back yard. It gets covered wth a dark green tarp for the winter. The tarp fills with snow and slush and gunk, and then the gunk melts. So, I guess from a duck-eye view—above and below and even on the surface, it looks like a pond.
The ducks come every year. The same ducks.
And astonishingly, I was clearing out the photos in my camera recently, and found the duck-arrival-photo from last year. And it was dated, March 14. This year the ducks arrived on March 14.
I ask you.
How do they do that?
We named the first couple the first year they visited. The male, Flo. The female, Eddy. (Flo and Eddy, I thought, was kind of watery sounding.) More ducks arrived, we named them Not-Flo and Not-Eddy. And then Evil Duck, Spot-Front and No-Neck.( We're not that good at naming ducks. ) (No-Neck has no white ring around his neck. Evil Duck is always biting, and Spot-Front has a--well, you can figure that out.)
We feed them, duck food, although the Audubon Society told us not to. (So sue us. The ducks clamber out of the pool and waddle to the back door when they see me, so who could resist that?)
But the point of this--and I bet you're glad to hear there IS one—is that we have learned a lot about human nature, and just nature, I guess, from watching the ducks. When Flo and Eddy arrived, they swam around, explored, floated, lumbered to the side of the pool and sat in the sun. Sometimes they sleep balanced one one foot, head tucked under a wing, which is pretty funny. And seems very difficult.
But all in all (except for some duck sex which is kind of hard to explain) they were peaceful.
When I came out to feed them, Flo would protect Eddy, making sure she got food first. It was very sweet, and made me think about true love. Then one day Flo and Eddy arrived, and soon after, Not-Flo. Another male. T-rouble. Not-Flo bugged Eddy, followed her around.
Flo just went crazy. Biting, swimming fast, hopping up on the side of the pool and standing on his little duck feet and flapping his wings. Eddy would fast-waddle away from Not-Flo (they're fast swimmers, very lithe in the water, but they are really bad walkers.) Sometimes she waddles so fast she has to fly a little, to get ahead. It's pretty funny.
Finally, Flo just attacked, quacking like mad and snipping at Not-Flo with his beak. He eventually drove Not-Flo, flapping and hopping, away. To celebrate his victory, Flo stretched full out in the water, almost standing on the surface, lifting his neck to its full length, making himself as big as possible, and beating his wings in victory.
We came outside, and Not-Flo was ON THE ROOF of our house, looking down. You haven't laughed until you've seen a duck on the roof of your house. It's something about the webbed feet on shingles, or something. It's just so unlikely.
(The photo shows Flo and Eddy on the roof. They now go up there all the time.)
Jonathan and I--devoted to duck-watching--began to learn about duck habits. Kind of like E.O.Wilson and the ants, only not so erudite, and we didnt write anything down about it.
For instance. When there are two or more ducks together, and one of them wants to fly away, they for some duck-reason have to make sure everone else wants to leave, too. So they do something with their necks--uh, let's see. Remember Walk like an Egyptian? Do that head-move, poking out your chin and neck.
That's what they do. So one duck will do the neck-bill move, kind of fast, and then see if everyone else does it, too. When they are all bobbing their heads in exactly the same rhythm--they ALL take off and fly away. At exactly the same time.
And I've seen it happen. One will start doing the head thing, and the others look at him (it's always a male who starts it) and ignore him and swim away. Duck number one stops. Later, he'll try again, and sometimes the others are ready to go by then. Duck one will NEVER leave by himself.
When there's a male and female alone together, fine. The swim, they dive underwater, they sun on the side of the pool. When they're just floating, they stick to the exact middle of the pool, farthest from the edge where marauding squirrels and cats may hover. (We chase the cats away. I love cats, but these are from next door, and they shouldn't be around the ducks.)
More pretty interesting duck sociology:
Where there are two females together, they're fine and they swim around. This is very rare, though, to have two females. They always look kind of--worried, scanning the sky and never sleeping. Until the male ducks arrive. I don't think I'm inmagining this. (Someday my prince will come?)
When there are two males and one female, it can get ugly. As y u saw with the arrival of not-Flo. And if I bring food out when there are three? The dominant male will do anything to keep the second male from eating. The domaint male will attack the other male INSTEAD of eating. He'd rather keep the other guy from the food than eat his own. (Better to starve than be submissive? You can always get dinner later when the intruder is conquered.)
However! If there are just two males? The same two, Flo and Not-Flo? They're fine together. They swim, the float, they sleep, they share food, they're dandy. Best buds. Peaceful and serene. As long as there's no female duck. (Women are always the prize?)
When the female arrives in male-duck world, all hell breaks loose. She's attacked and, well, duck-banged. (No comment. I keep telling her--you can fly, sweetheart! If you really want to get away, you can do it. No reason to stay in this abusive relationship. But she doesn't fly. Again, I ask you. What can we learn from this?)
Three males and a female? That's a different deal. The two males hang together, the duck couple hangs together, they're peaceful. And they share food. (Dinner party.) Three males and no female. Fine. Good buddies.Five males--which is often who come to visit--all happy and pals. (Fraternity.) One male is always the dominant one, its very clear, and he's the one who decides when to leave. (There's always a boss.)
And where there are two males and two females, it's very clear who the couples are. And they stick together. Share food. And leave together. (Double dating is a good thing.)
We have seen no ducklings. Like any good parents, we are WAITING to see some ducklings. Maybe next year.
So have you learned anything from your animals? My cats taught me that sleep is good, and that you CAN provide food for yourself, but if you can get someone to make dinner for you, all the better. How about you?
