All 4 ducklings survived the night but this morning 3 of them, and mum, were on the Slea and the other one was in the mouth of the Old Slea weir. The last couple of times some ducklings have been in the weir, I have left them to their own devises because mum has been with them and she can guide the little ones up back to the Slea. Not today though, the duckling was calling mum but she wasn’t responding so I went onto the weir and again caught the duckling and took him/her to the Slea. I am only doing this as a last resort and soon they will be too big and quick for me to catch so I am just hoping they get to know how to get back to the Slea from the weir themselves as soon as possible. They seem to be down the weir most mornings at the moment so I am wondering if mum takes them down there each night ???
Anyway all 4 survived the cold night again so I am getting more confident that they are big enough to survive the cold nights at the moment, but I still hope we don’t get any nights that are much colder than now until the ducklings are quite a bit bigger.
Here is one of the Mallards just touching down on the Slea…
Terry