Diablevert

Splish Splash

Duck in the reflecting pool at the Garden of Remembrance, Parnell Square

I saw this duck one day chillin' like a villian while I was eating my lunch. He was only there that day, but a week later, when I didn't have my phone, a mama duck showed up with six baby ducks. (One of whom was yellow instead of gray and brown. I mean, I ain't sayin', I'm just sayin'.) The thing was, the ducks had not been there the day before. And as you can see from the photo, the rim of the pool is of concrete, with a gentle slope on the inside but two sheer faces on the outside, the top one slightly overhanging the bottom. As the ducks were cruising around in duck formation, occassionally some of the ducklings would hop up on the side of the pool and walk around on the rim. Then one of them fell off, landing on the other side unharmed. Thus ensued a frantic round of Quacko Polo.

I had to go back to work a few minutes later, with the ducks still trying to find each other and a hovering crowd of lunching office wrokers and little kids trying to decide whether to venture over and heave him back in. (Is that thing about wild animlas smelling human on their offspring and rejecting them true for ducks?) So I don't know what happened; all I know is they were gone the next day.

This still leaves the mystery: how the hell did they get into the pool in the first place? The ducklings were clearly too little to fly, and as can been seen from the photo above, the rim of the pool is well over head height for an adult duck, so hopping seems out. Do ducks pick up their young by the scruff of the neck, like cats kittens? And where did they come from? And where did they go?