Wood Duck (TX)
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The cam went online June 10, with 10 eggs in the nest!
Species: Wood Duck (Aix sponsa)
Location: Greenville, TX
Status: All nine ducklings jumped out of the box on July 7th!
Location: Greenville, TX
Status: All nine ducklings jumped out of the box on July 7th!
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2006 Daily Highlights:
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Fledging day, just 36 hours after hatching! One
by one, within a 30 minute span, they all jump ship! Here is the first
one climbing out! FIRST TWO LEAVE (30 sec video) |
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Second one to go. |
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Only six left! FOUR MORE FLEDGE (1 min video) |
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Now four |
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The third to last duckling climbs the ladder. THREE LEFT (1 min video) |
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Two left! LAST TWO FLEGDE (1 min video) |
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Bye bye little ducklings, and good luck! |
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July 7 - Morning finds Mom in a sea of
ducklings. It looks as though all nine have hatched. They will
probably leave the nest box today--we will keep watching! |
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July 6 - HATCHING! The ducklings began to hatch yesterday, peeping and cracking their shells. Here is a sweet view of a duckling! |
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More ducklings scramble out from under their mother. |
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The female left the newly-hatched ducklings for a short time, allowing us a good view of them. |
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It is hard to tell how many hatched, but it looks like 8 or all 9 at this point. |
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Mom returned shortly. |
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The mother left a few more times today, and spent a lot of time perched in the entrance of the box. |
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She returned to the box for good in the evening. __________________________________________ |
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July 4 - One egg has been missing since the 30th. This female continues to incubate her remaining 9 eggs. |
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June 30 - While the female is not on the nest, she is foraging. Wood ducks have a broad diet that includes seeds, fruits, and small aquatic and terrestrial invertebrates. |
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June 27 - Not all of these eggs
may belong to this female, since egg dumping is common in wood ducks.
However, 10 is a low number for a dump (parasitized) nest, which
usually contains at least 16 eggs. |
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June 21 - The male wood duck plays no
role during the incubation period or the rearing of the ducklings,
though he escorts the hen to and from the nest box every day while she
is laying the eggs. |
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June 17 - Mom heads out to get
something to eat, leaving the eggs covered in bedding. She is
usually gone for 2 to 3 hours. |
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June 15 - Once again, the female covers her eggs before leaving the box, making them barely distinguishable. |
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June 14 - The female passes time
preening her feathers. Since incubation began on the 9th, these
eggs should hatch sometime between the 4th and 16th of July, though the
incubation period is widely variable. |
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June 12 - The incubation period for wood ducks can last for anywhere between 25 and 37 days. |
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June 11 - These three photos below show the female
Wood Duck carefully disguising her eggs with nest material before
leaving to find food. |
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She uses her foot to push shavings and down over the eggs. |
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The female pulls downy feathers from her own breast to use as nest material. |
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June 10 - This is the first day of pictures from this
camera. The female Wood Duck began incubating 10 eggs on June 9th. Our
cam host tells us that the first egg was laid on May 28th. |