Lone Duck arrived at Dogwood’s pond sometime in December along with fellow wood ducks (Aix sponsa). The wood ducks use Dogwood’s pond as a weigh point along their migration path and usually only stay 4 to 6 weeks. Early this year, when his buddies flew off to continue their migration, Lone Duck stayed behind on Dogwood Pond. He was the lone duck on the pond, gently swimming to and fro keeping at least ¾ of the pond between him and us. I guess he decided hanging out at Dogwood was the good life, so he decided to stay as while. He seems to like swimming close to the bubbles from the diffuser in the pond, maybe the bubbles tickle his tail feathers.
Lone Duck is a male. He sports crested head of iridescent green and purple with a white stripe from the eye to the end of the crest. The bill is brightly patterned black, white and red. Since female wood ducks have a gray-brown head and neck with a brownish, green, glossed crest we are confident Lone Duck is a male.
First notice of the wood ducks’ arrival at Dogwood occurs pretty much the same way each year. We pull up to the gate at Dogwood, rattle the chain lock and we are startled by a whoosh! The whoosh is the 10-20 wood ducks suddenly flying from the water up to the tree branches of the nearby woods.
After his buddies left this year, at first we thought that Lone Duck might be sick or unable to fly so he stayed behind. We expected to see him wither away left all on his own. Fortunately, he seemed to be healthy and was maybe just a loner. According to Wood Duck Society, some wood ducks don’t migrate with the rest, are loners and very picky about choosing a mate, as they should be.
Yesterday, Lone Duck was gone. Hopefully, he found a girlfriend who shook her tail at him enough that she lured him north. There are no ducks on the pond now.
