Saturday, 19 April 2014

Quackers! (A to Z challenge)

Ducks quack, geese honk but what do swans do.  Well apparently not quack - they hiss, so there goes  my opportunity to put up some lovely pictures of swans!  And I've settled for some ducks in flight.  Ducks are not the most graceful of birds, especially when taking flight, in fact some of the larger mallards, appear to defy gravity when taking off with their plump bodies.
Mallard in flight
Arran has an abundance of wildlife and in particular birds. For the last 34 consecutive years a bird report has been produced by the Arran Natural History Society (through the hard work of various bird recorders over the years, currently Jim Cassels) and in 2013, 160 species were recorded on Arran.
Shelduck in flight
Now ducks are often overlooked, after all, most towns have a duck pond somewhere.  And most people have at some time lobbed stale bread on some muddy bank.  But here the ducks are in their natural habitat, varied in species, with the beautifully marked Shelducks, Wigeon, Mallard, Eider, Teal, Red breasted Merganser, and other less frequent visitors, they are worth watching.  More on the birds of Arran, including recent sightings can be found here.
Wigeon in flight

4 comments:

  1. Great photos and topic! Thanks.


    Beth
    bethlapinsatozblog.wordpress.com/

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  2. Beautiful photographs. Keep going!

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  3. Visiting from the A to Z Challenge, had to stop in and say hi because I'm kind of your neighbour. I live on Bute, right next door. ;-)

    I love your photos, particularly the first and last ones in this post.

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    1. Thank you - hope you like the blogs - I'll check yours out.

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