female mallard

Mother duck and her ducklings.

..... thought he was a fine gent, so set off in hot pursuit after him! A female Mallard following on behind the male I showed you yesterday. She doesn't look so bad herself, does she.

This female Mallard arrived to clear up the droppings from the untidy feeder birds. They do have lovely plumage when seen close too, don't they. TTTW

This Mallard seemed to be powering along. The light in this area was quite different, and didn't look too attractive until she passed through, making some silvery highlights in the water.

There isn't a great variety of bird life to be seen in late July/August, along the canal; in fact there was hardly a sound from them either!! But the setting seemed to make up for it somehow. The first day I was there I heard a Chiffchaff, but couldn't find it in the foliage, and never heard it...

This single lady was in a much shadier spot that the previous ones I saw on the water. I always found it difficult to tell females apart from eclipse males, until I discovered that males always retain the yellow bill.... easy-peasy now LOL

For a while it seemed that all the birds were busy trying to make themselves look good for the camera LOL. The light still in the wrong direction, so some PP work needed again. Sports Mode settings f/5.6 1/250 sec ISO 400 Exp bias +0.7 Focal length 185 mm Max aperture 3 Metering mode Pattern

I got a double here... loved the colour of the water and her pose!! Unfortunately I'm not good enough at processing pictures in order to get her a bit lighter without spoiling the water colours. Sorry about that.

A female Mallard came wandering through the undergrowth near the feeding station; it seemed to be quite a way from water, but I suppose that's relative really!

well a duck i do know and many thanks for all your comments on my im not sure one yesterday did not post it in the id forum.when i looked at this image i felt rather sorry for this female mallard.we have no young mallards on my pond yet and two females are back early so i presume no success at...

On the other side of the road to yesterday's Oyc, is the swamp end of the reserve with a grassy field that the Highland Cattle love. There was a pair of Mallards there, but I didn't see any young, maybe too early. Seen my first youngster today... the Starlings seem to have fledged. And a...

Nearing the end of 'good' pictures from that visit to Kinnordy, though there may be some silly ones for Saturdays;) Yeah... even this camera doesn't stop me being stupid!! I'm still rather impressed by the amount of detail I can get with my new toy - hope you like her too.

The sun that day was lovely and it's really brought out his beautiful iridescence I think. Can't get over how closely I can crop the pictures now. He was out the front of the Gullery hide.

took this yesterday and how gorgeous she looked in that snow.

this gorgeous mallard and the other birds gave me some laugh the other day on frozen water.

During that period (about 2 months) there were very few ducks used the water at the front of the hide. In fact there were very few ducks visible at all!! As the light began to fail Mrs M decided to risk it. It was so still though, I rather liked the wake and reflections in this picture. EDIT...

There weren't many species visible that mid-August day, but this group of Mallards swam past in front of the hide (not that close though unfortunately). It was, as usual, "you should have been here half an hour ago!"