I, of course, was a smitten kitten, oohing and ahhing and giggling, drawing everyone's attention who came by to the mama duck and her 11 darlings. The 5 year old in me nearly prevailed in convincing myself it would be a good idea to make off with one of the ducklings, but I resisted.
Normally I would have just chalked this up to a lucky sighting to brighten my day, but there was more behind my run in with the little duck family... my ducky senses were being honed. I'll tell you why.
A little later we were driving home from the grocery when I saw a duck, much like the mama I had seen this morning, on the side of the road quacking and circling around, agitated and distraught. I knew something wasn't right. I told Sam, "Look at that duck, that's not normal. I think she's looking for something." Sam drove past her without a thought. We were almost home when I made him turn around.
When we got back to the duck she was still irritated, circling and quacking. "I think she's lost her ducklings." I said, and I hopped out of the car (much to my husband's dismay). There was a storm drain near and I went directly to it. On my hand and knees in the street, sure enough, I could see two little chirping ducklings at the bottom of the drain!!! My eyes brimmed with tears and my heart immediately broke for that little mama duck. So helpless, being able to hear her ducklings' cries but not being able to find them! They were chirping wildly, terrified. The mama bear in me took over.
"We need a net!!" I shouted at Sam. He had gotten Leah out of the car and was standing in the street at this point. He looked at me, "Uh, well, we don't have one." Then I remembered I had left our tool kit in the trunk of the car. "Get the tools so we can take off this grate!"
Sam got our tool kit and, as luck would have it, our bathroom garbage pail that was still in the trunk from our move. After a struggle, he was finally able to get the grate off and I could see the drain was about 5 or 6 feet down. There were large tunnels running off of the hole in several directions and the ducklings, in fear, kept running off down the tunnels. Each time it happened, their cries would get softer and mama duck would come closer, calling loudly to them to bring them back in view.
I laid on my stomach with the garbage pail in hand and hung from the waist into the drain. I could reach the garbage almost to the bottom and I hung there unsuccessfully for about five minutes, trying to coax the ducklings into the pail. We won't mention what a foolio I was, hanging upside down, trying to imitate the mama duck.
After the ducklings scurried off down one of the tunnels again I pulled myself out of the hole and kneeled on the side of the street. I folded my arms and prayed that Heavenly Father would please help me save these little ducks.
I shimmied on my stomach down into the drain again and, I'm not kidding, immediately BOTH ducklings came scurrying back and jumped up INTO my garbage pail!!!! I shouted out in laughter!! I couldn't BELIEVE it!!! I felt overwhelmingly thankful for my answered prayer.
I hoisted the two little dears out of the hole and, after snapping a few pics, walked to mama who was still quacking up a storm a few feet away.
I set the pail down in the grass and the ducklings hustled out to their mom. She quacked at them SO LOUDLY and I have never seen anything cuter as they JUMPED onto her back over and over! It was such a celebration!! After the reunion they fell right back into their little formation and started making their way off into an oblivion. Needless to say, our hearts were bursting...
The little fluff balls still captive in our garbage pail. So so cute.
Sam took this little video after the glorious reunion
