Happy killdeer chicks and ducklings

Mom and baby killdeer

I found two more duckling families near the entrance. One of them had 10 ducklings when I saw them on Saturday. That one Canada gander got into some kind of tirade and tried to kill him, but me and some other people stopped him. There was also a family of three tiny ducklings, too. The mom of the 10 ducklings is Flycatcher's mom and the other is Drama Mama, the mother of the drama ducklings.

Today, I saw that the family of 10 was down to 9, but doing well.





The rouen mama who originally had 11 ducklings was down to 3 on Saturday. I haven't seen the other female around, but I assume she's hiding somewhere with a few more. One of the three didn't look well. I don't know if it's because it ate some of the Easter candy that people threw all over the place yesterday, or it was just tired and cold:



These two are my favorites:






The Killdeer Family:

The M6 (Beautiful dad) family is doing great. I finally got to see all four chicks, all boys, it seems. One of them was really small, about half the size of the other ones. The parents were amazingly calm and let me walk right up to the chicks. But, the chicks didn't like it and didn't let me get really close. They ran really fast!






My battery ran out in my camera, so I missed photographing a bonding mating by the two parents. Also, big sister Shy snuck in and tried to brood the tiniest chick, but mom chased her away.

I just hope that people keep their dogs away from that area, or in the very least, on a leash.

Killer and D. are doing well. I think D. has a nest already. Junior is also setting up shop with his mate, too. Shy and her mate are having problems. It appears that several other males are after Shy for a mate. But, Shy seems to be only interested in babies.

Oreo is missing:

The mottled black and white runner duck, Oreo is missing. Her posse was around as were all the other ducks except Oreo and Daisy. Daisy goes missing once in a while, so I'm not too worried about her. But, I've never had a day where I couldn't find Oreo. I also saw some black and white feathers laying around, but I think that was from the geese fighting. Hopefully, Oreo is just sitting on a nest of eggs somewhere and she will be seen again, soon.