In the winter, many of the ducks that live and breed in the far north of our continent come down to the gulf coast area. In many parts of Louisiana, you can find thousands of ducks and geese collecting on flooded fields, harvested grain fields, and lakes. But, right here in Baton Rouge, we get a fair variety of these winter birds on our city lakes. At the Capitol lakes, for example, we get several species....mostly Ring-necked Ducks and Lesser Scaups, but we also get some more exotic species, like Canvasbacks, Hooded Mergansers, Ruddy Ducks, Gadwalls, and this year...Buffleheads. If you get a chance, head down to the lakes with your binoculars and see if you can pick out the different types of ducks. Oh, and those black birds with white bills??? Yeah, those aren't ducks. See if you can figure out what they are!
When I was out there this weekend, there was a family getting their pictures taken -- family portrait type stuff. While the grownups were getting done, a couple of the boys were down at the water's edge. There is a woman who feeds the ducks every day (and has for 30 years!) so some of the ducks come to the shore when people are there. One of the boys started throwing rocks at the ducks. The ducks scattered, but other ducks from the other side of the lake came flying in because they thought there was food. The boys were pretending to shoot the ducks, and the adults were encouraging them. They didn't even seem self-conscious with me standing there watching. I know that hunting is very much a part of our culture here, but that just seemed wrong to me. Hard to say something when the whole family's there egging on the kid.
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