Every year, I have a pair of Mallards that hangs out in my creek. They’re there every day, swimming around, looking all spiffy.
I would like nothing more than to one day see baby Mallards out there. So far, they seem to take off sometime mid-June rather than hanging out and raising a family.
Is there anything I can do to make the creek more attractive to them? They seem to like it just fine for hanging out and swimming. Nesting boxes? Some sort of aphrodisiac duck food? Mood music?
Sorry, I really thought the thread title was a euphemism.
For what???
I had the opposite problem just a while back, and it concerned me. A pair of ducks took a real liking to my back 40 where the spring floods make a lagoon of sorts. I didn’t want them hanging around and nesting, because the flood is only very temporary and I didn’t want the little ducklings to suffer. Also, the neighbors say we have foxes. I think they ran off before making eggs, thank goodnes.
I’m guessing he clicked in for the express purpose of finding out.
Mallards LOVE sunflower seeds… if you start to feed them some, regularly, they’ll become attached to that area… don’t worry about them forgetting how to continue their normal feeding patterns (fish, insects, etc)… the sunflower seeds, are just a treat and it will keep them coming back to a certain area and after a while, they’ll consider it their home ground.
They’re sensitive to possible nest intrusions by dogs, cats, kids, etc. If you can somehow create an obviously secure spot (a small island?) their chance of sticking around will increase.
An artificial nest site might help. Here’s a site that gives some designs.
Mallards seem to be as common as mud here in the UK - certainly in London most large ponds appear to have a pair or two. The most common nesting assistance is a small raft made out of something like a pallet, with half a bale of straw dumped on top and moored well away from the edge. Depending on the size of the raft, it soon becomes occupied by ducks, geese, swans, cormorants, coots, or whatever. If the creek is slow-moving something like that might work, but I don’t know if predators like mink or racoons would be able to swim out and nobble the eggs.
Nest boxes and things are a good idea just on general principles anyway - if you don’t get mallards you’ll probably get something else equally attractive to reproduce…
Thanks for the ideas. I will look into the nesting box.
The creek itself is pretty secluded. I can see it from my house, but it’s down a ravine. The occasional kid wanders by and maybe stops to fish - but that’s pretty rare. Mostly it’s just me or Mr. Athena who might go down there, and if we do that twice a week that’s pretty often. Many months go by where we never go down there.
It’s really not big enough for an island. Maybe 8 feet across at it’s widest point, and most places are much narrower. The wide point is in a fish hold that the previous owners of the house dug out.
Doesn’t sound like prime mallard territory to me, I’ve only seen them in places with broader stretches of water like ponds/lakes/docks/rivers/broad streams - but that may be because I don’t go pottering around streams very often.
Where’s an experienced twitcher when you need one?