Meet a mallard drake named Iceman the Duck. We named him that because he almost froze to death during the first bad freeze of this winter. He's a little miracle duck! A few weeks ago, one night the temps went down from 20 degrees to below zero in just a matter of a few hours. To make things worse there was a terrible wind that just wouldn't stop blowing. Parts of the pond that hadn't frozen yet sprayed upon this little guy as he lounged on the ice and his left wing became frozen to the surface of the pond. Iceman struggled for most the day to free himself, twisting the stuck wing into what looked like a feathered pretzel. He was too far out for a person to reach him (my husband tried twice) so he had to free himself with only the help of the sunshine. We really thought we were going to lose him for a while there.
Somehow between his struggling and the warm sun (it never really did go above freezing that day) this duck got himself free of the ice! Now his wing is torn up pretty badly as he needed to pull out a bunch of feathers to free himself, but he seems to be pretty much back to normal now. Unfortunately he cannot fly so he and another mallard drake with a damaged wing have become fast friends and always travel around here together. We call that one Parky. Happily they like to stop by our patio for food and we happily oblige!
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