11 September 2010

How much is too much?

| planeguy
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bread

Was down at the lake today, having a look at the ducks and swans, and a gent and his daughter drove up, and started feeding the ducks. Not unusual when people bring a roll, or a few slices of stale bread. However, these people had enough bread to keep Brumbies in business for a week. Plastic bag after plastic bag of bread rolls, unsliced loaves etc… were ripped up and just hurled to the birds. After about five minutes, the ducks that were nearby had obviously had there fill and so swam off. Here is a pic of one part of what was left over.

Seriously, people. Finding a rubbish bin isn’t that hard.

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grumpyrhonda7:10 pm 13 Sep 10

Woody Mann-Caruso said :

they end up too fat to fly

And with delicious, creamy livers.

Yum

VikingWizardEyes9:39 am 12 Sep 10

Woody Mann-Caruso said :

they end up too fat to fly

And with delicious, creamy livers.

Mmmm Pâté

Some crazy old guy brings bags of seed into civic to feed the flying rats. At least ducks are good for shooting.

Bread won’t hurt ducks or other birds – it’s not the only food they eat. Bread unlike paper or plastic is biodegradable. This is is not a problem. 😀

What, we can’t get rid of all our old bread and make the side of the lake look like a Bakers Delight now, geez, whats the world come to! 🙂

i saw duck once…

Woody Mann-Caruso6:39 pm 11 Sep 10

they end up too fat to fly

And with delicious, creamy livers.

Duck parents are certainly known for keeping their ducklings under close supervision – you see mum in the lead, a row of little ducklings, and then dad bringing up the rear.

Sharks, swordfish and rays are hardly known for their parental technique, so I’m actually surprised to hear they were even used in this context (I haven’t yet been to a public pool in Australia, so there you go).

Outta Control5:32 pm 11 Sep 10

OT I know, but since we’re talking about ducks …

The other day I was at the pool and I noticed a poster aimed at parents with the message to keep watch on the kids whilst they’re in the pool. It had a logo featuring a duck swimming with “Keep Watch” underneath. Are ducks particularly observant? Usually at pools you see swim clubs and paraphernalia featuring sharks, dolphins and even swordfish and stingrays. This is the first time I’ve seen a duck used like this.

JessicaNumber4:47 pm 11 Sep 10

–Begin vegan rant–
Basically white bread is junk food to ducks. If they are fed a few nibbles of it each month they are fine, but unfortunately it only takes 30 families to go feed the ducks once a month before they have a daily bread meal.

Bread doesn’t have the nutrients ducks need but it’s high in calories so they end up too fat to fly and with malnutrition. It’s particularly hard on the ducklings which leads us to…

Ducks being fed aren’t learning to forage for the food they actually need. Ducklings raised this way will never learn.

And while the ducks are behaving unusually they start to get into overcrowding, fighting for morsels, with disease risk and all the usual problems from overpopulation.
–End vegan rant–

Ducks are cute. It’s great that they will come over for a treat and even this year I have fed water birds. Once. But instead of throwing them bread, get some duck food from a pet shop, which is healthy, or better yet something natural like some grains or veggies!

And in answer to the original question, if you throw more food than the duck can eat, it will only decay in the water inviting bacteria (as if our lakes weren’t icky enough) or rats (or both).

White bread is bad enough for humans, so imagine what it’s doing to the ducks. Won’t somebody please think of the ducks?!

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