Walking downstream past Cogglesford Mill Alan and I saw a mum with quite a large batch of ducklings and she was heading towards the Mill. I have seen this before and the mum sometimes takes the ducklings up the slope, over the Mill walkway, jumps into the Slea and then continues upstream through the Mill bridge. I have also seen where some duckling takes a wrong turning and is swept away down the Mill ramp/weir. Mum took the ducklings as above and all jumped in but one turned the wrong way and was swept down the Mill ramp/weir, he tried to swim against the strong current and obviously could not make it back. The only solution was to jump in the ramp/weir (its only about a foot deep but slippery) and try and catch the duckling, which I managed to do as he was paddling like mad to get upstream but the current took him slowly towards me. I was lucky that he didnt try and rush past me so I managed to get him in my hands. Mum was by now about 150 feet away with the other ducklings, so I knew I had to get ‘my’ duckling quite a way upstream and not just put him near the bridge. The hardest bit was getting out the ramp/weir while still holding onto the duckling without holding too tightly. Then squeeze through a small gap between 2 trees (its a good job I am slim – no comments please 
) and then get to mum and reunite duckling and family So I was pleased to have done my good deed for the day but I did take home with me a bit of the River Slea water in my shoes
Here are the ducklings just about to jump into the Slea after mum had done so…
Terry