June 6th-8th - At 11:30 PM June 6th, due to a incident involving Oscar, our Dachshund and a raccoon, I discovered that our visiting Mallard drake (now named Henry) was indeed spending the night in our pond, which was quite a surprise! The next day, June 7th, he spent the majority of the day swimming around close to the far bank, but we had no sign of the hen (now named Gertrude). Today, we have not seen Henry, but Gertrude made a visit for some corn at midday. There are now sheltered areas to nest and we have had enough rain to keep the pond level up...so here's hoping! I have uploaded five images of pond life from the 7th of June (Henry, tadpoles, two of the snapping turtle), and one of Gertrude from the 8th.
June 5th - We have not seen any Wood Ducks since May 19th, but both of the Mallards have been here off and on through today, June 5th.
At 6 AM on June 3rd, they were actually on our deck exploring!!! BTW, there was also a raccoon within a few feet of the Mallards...neither paid any attention to the other.
Here are some images of them exploring our yard and in the pond taken June 1st, 2nd, 5th...unfortunately it was too dark to catch them while they were on the deck June 3rd.
May 1st - The mallards and wood ducks are still showing up in the evening.I found this shot from last year, taken June 25th which shows what can happen to our pond when it doesn't rain...it's filled by rain watershed from our hills. It also is why we are not really expecting any nesting around here...however, there are creeks and runs within a 1/2 mi.

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