Duck Soup

What's cuter than a duckling? Seven ducklings on a log...

Because of the drought, many of the smaller arms of the lake are filling with algae and look almost solid. This mama and her brood just fit on a log, but I would not have liked to see them swimming through that pea soup to get to it. Last year there were signs warning dog owners not to let their dogs swim in the lake due to toxic "blue/green algae". 

There was a large night heron sleeping among the branches of a fallen tree (another victim of the drought) and a hawk perched on a branch, silhouetted against the lake. Later we saw him swoop down and grab a fish out of a man's hand as he attempted to put it on a stringer. From the man's exclamations, I gather the hawk got his other fish as well. Neatly done, without having to put so much as the tip of his beak in the toxic looking lake.

Further around the lake the swans were quite close to shore, busily preening themselves. Their necks, which they stick into the water looking for food, looked like the dirty necks of small boys…very unswanlike. I put a picture of one of them in the extras.

The drought is affecting everything.