Monday – Quack Attack!
Feb. 16th, 2009 03:11 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ninanevermore.
.
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Jeff and I took our young son to the neighborhood park yesterday, to enjoy the playground and to feed all the stale bread we've been saving up to the local ducks. All but one of the ducks acted grateful and polite. The one dissenter, a Muscovy drake, decided that we were invading his turf and needed to be taught a lesson.
For weeks we've been tossing our loaves of stale bread into a bag with the intention of making a trip to the lake to feed the ducks. Before we set off, Jeff and I tore the stale bread into to duck-friendly pieces. Some of it was yeasty, and Jeff commented that it smelled like beer.
"I wonder if it will get them drunk?" he mused. "I wonder what a drunk mallard acts like?"
"A sober mallard is an a$$hole, so I figure a drunk mallard would be a bigger one," I said.
After we were forced to witness to a duck orgy a couple years ago when they surrounded us en mass in the park and began engaging in a party that would make Bacchus himself blush, I've had some reservations about Mallard ducks. Their mating habits are downright brutal, to the point that it is not unheard of for the hens to die during the act from broken necks or (if the mating takes place in the water) drowning. Nevertheless, I thought Muscovies weren't quite so bad. At least, I did until yesterday.
When we reached the park, one particular drake began to follow us, quacking in a low way that sounded like a duck version of a growl and raising his crest. We ignored him. I mean, seriously, he was just a duck. After we finished distributing our food offering to the lakes feathered inhabitants, this duck followed us into the fenced playground and began to act as menacing as a duck possibly can.
"He has a high opinion of himself," Jeff observed.
"I think he's been hanging out with the geese a little too much," I said.
There are a pair of geese that hang out at the lake and act as lords and guardians over all the other waterfowl. The white one tends to keep company with the Muscovies, and the gray goose hangs out mostly with the Mallards and Pekins (who are a bleached out, domesticated variety of Mallard).
Unless you have never been chased by a goose, you probably don't think they are scary. The reality is that they are very aggressive and when one of them spreads his wings and lowers his head to come after you, three thoughts race through your mind. Your first thought is, Damn, that is one huge, mean-looking bird! Your next thought is That beak looks big enough to take out a hunk of my flesh. Your third thought is #$%#! it, I'm out of here! I have seen tough, grown men turn tail and run from geese. It's easy to laugh when you see this, until the goose changes direction and comes toward you, instead.
But this was not a goose. It was a 16 pound duck with a chip on his shoulder.
My son had climbed the ladder to the slide and refused to come down.
"I don't like that duck," he said.
"Go away, duck," I said. The duck made his odd little duck-growl and raised the feathers of his crest, which made him look like he had a Mohawk.
"Shoo!" Jeff said. The duck puffed out his check, spread his wings to make himself look bigger, and stepped toward Jeff. Jeff used his foot to nudge the bird back. The bird then flew up, grabbed the leg of Jeff's jeans in his beak and flapped his wings.
I took a few steps back. Jeff kicked at the bird in earnest this time, and chased it out of the playground by shouting at it and clapping his hands. The drake at this point decided that Jeff was a more powerful bird than he'd figured and scrambled under the fence to the playground to disappear among the other, more sane, ducks.
Jeff walked back, laughing. "You just want to say him, Dude, you're just a duck. Take it easy. Nobody takes you seriously."
"He took himself pretty seriously," I said.
"No kidding. What a little jerk."
"Daddy?" a small voice from the top of the slide inquired, "It the mean duck gone, now?"
We assured our son that it was now safe on the ground again, so he slid down. I won't be surprised if he has a life long aversion to ducks in general, the way some other people are afraid of mice or snakes. I will try to help him put his phobia in perspective by explaining there are much scarier things in the world than ducks.
Geese, for example, are downright evil.
* ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * # * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ *
.
.
Jeff and I took our young son to the neighborhood park yesterday, to enjoy the playground and to feed all the stale bread we've been saving up to the local ducks. All but one of the ducks acted grateful and polite. The one dissenter, a Muscovy drake, decided that we were invading his turf and needed to be taught a lesson.
For weeks we've been tossing our loaves of stale bread into a bag with the intention of making a trip to the lake to feed the ducks. Before we set off, Jeff and I tore the stale bread into to duck-friendly pieces. Some of it was yeasty, and Jeff commented that it smelled like beer.
"I wonder if it will get them drunk?" he mused. "I wonder what a drunk mallard acts like?"
"A sober mallard is an a$$hole, so I figure a drunk mallard would be a bigger one," I said.
After we were forced to witness to a duck orgy a couple years ago when they surrounded us en mass in the park and began engaging in a party that would make Bacchus himself blush, I've had some reservations about Mallard ducks. Their mating habits are downright brutal, to the point that it is not unheard of for the hens to die during the act from broken necks or (if the mating takes place in the water) drowning. Nevertheless, I thought Muscovies weren't quite so bad. At least, I did until yesterday.
When we reached the park, one particular drake began to follow us, quacking in a low way that sounded like a duck version of a growl and raising his crest. We ignored him. I mean, seriously, he was just a duck. After we finished distributing our food offering to the lakes feathered inhabitants, this duck followed us into the fenced playground and began to act as menacing as a duck possibly can.
"He has a high opinion of himself," Jeff observed.
"I think he's been hanging out with the geese a little too much," I said.
There are a pair of geese that hang out at the lake and act as lords and guardians over all the other waterfowl. The white one tends to keep company with the Muscovies, and the gray goose hangs out mostly with the Mallards and Pekins (who are a bleached out, domesticated variety of Mallard).
Unless you have never been chased by a goose, you probably don't think they are scary. The reality is that they are very aggressive and when one of them spreads his wings and lowers his head to come after you, three thoughts race through your mind. Your first thought is, Damn, that is one huge, mean-looking bird! Your next thought is That beak looks big enough to take out a hunk of my flesh. Your third thought is #$%#! it, I'm out of here! I have seen tough, grown men turn tail and run from geese. It's easy to laugh when you see this, until the goose changes direction and comes toward you, instead.
But this was not a goose. It was a 16 pound duck with a chip on his shoulder.
My son had climbed the ladder to the slide and refused to come down.
"I don't like that duck," he said.
"Go away, duck," I said. The duck made his odd little duck-growl and raised the feathers of his crest, which made him look like he had a Mohawk.
"Shoo!" Jeff said. The duck puffed out his check, spread his wings to make himself look bigger, and stepped toward Jeff. Jeff used his foot to nudge the bird back. The bird then flew up, grabbed the leg of Jeff's jeans in his beak and flapped his wings.
I took a few steps back. Jeff kicked at the bird in earnest this time, and chased it out of the playground by shouting at it and clapping his hands. The drake at this point decided that Jeff was a more powerful bird than he'd figured and scrambled under the fence to the playground to disappear among the other, more sane, ducks.
Jeff walked back, laughing. "You just want to say him, Dude, you're just a duck. Take it easy. Nobody takes you seriously."
"He took himself pretty seriously," I said.
"No kidding. What a little jerk."
"Daddy?" a small voice from the top of the slide inquired, "It the mean duck gone, now?"
We assured our son that it was now safe on the ground again, so he slid down. I won't be surprised if he has a life long aversion to ducks in general, the way some other people are afraid of mice or snakes. I will try to help him put his phobia in perspective by explaining there are much scarier things in the world than ducks.
Geese, for example, are downright evil.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2009-02-16 09:49 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-02-16 09:56 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-02-16 10:07 pm (UTC)also i am thrilled by your husbands victory over the duck with the napoleon complex.
no subject
Date: 2009-02-17 02:57 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-02-16 11:22 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-02-17 02:59 pm (UTC)I knew those things could do some damage. I'm not certain that a goose could kick my ass, but I'm very certain that every goose I've ever met was willing to try.
no subject
Date: 2009-02-16 11:46 pm (UTC)Too funny
no subject
Date: 2009-02-17 02:59 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-02-17 02:56 am (UTC)Sure enough, the ducks chased us. I've been back to that park many times since, without her--nice, polite ducks.
no subject
Date: 2009-02-17 03:01 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-02-17 02:25 pm (UTC)Jeff's so brave!! I would've freaked and ran away!!
no subject
Date: 2009-02-17 03:03 pm (UTC)It was just this one duck giving us a problem. The rest were perfectly nice. I guess crazy happens, and every species on the planet has its nut cases. :P
no subject
Date: 2009-02-17 03:40 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-02-17 05:06 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-02-19 08:27 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-02-20 04:34 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-02-20 07:57 pm (UTC)This wasn't even a mallard, though, it was a Muscovy. They're usually friendlier than the mallards. Ugly, but personable.
no subject
Date: 2009-02-20 10:14 pm (UTC)