A Well Kept Man

The birds/ducks of Lake Geneva...

I took advantage of the early Spring-like temperatures and sunny sky today and walked down to the lake to feed the ducks some stale bread. I managed to snap pictures of some of them, but it's tough to get a close shot as they swim away when they realize your camera is not bread (and perhaps all you were doing was luring them closer to you to snatch them and take them home as pets). I tried to avoid the pigeons and seagulls as they aren't as exciting to me as the ducks...there are hundreds of ducks, birds, gulls, etc. floating in between the various boats in the marina. The swans, gulls, and pigeons are the most adventurous and willingly will risk life and limb for whatever morsel you throw their way. The remaining ducks are much more skittish. The duck with the black body, grey bill, golden eye, and white patch on his side/belly dives under water to get whatever sinks, while the mallards tend to fight with each other (sometimes violently). Today, I watched as two mallards (males of course) locked their bills in a duel...there were feathers and quacks going all over the place (this might be mating season, or possibly they are all really hungry and just posturing, I'm not an expert). It is interesting to see the various foreign ducks (like the Pochards), even the Canadian geese seem interesting (it's always the same pair, I've never seen more than just these two...perhaps they are on permanent loan or something)