NATURE PHOTO SEQUENCE OF THE DAY

It's a harsh world out there.

(Thanks to Robert in Austin)

Comments

[russell]

*gasp*...Pennywise?

[Obi-Wan]

FRIST! I mean. First!

[Higgy]

Well, at least ONE got across.....

Okay, that's still pretty bad...

[Lairbo]

LOL. Thanx.

Now I have to go clean the coffee off my keyboard.

[kibby F5]

Lairbo, did it come out your nose?

[Barbara Mack]

I don't see anything funny here.

[queensbee]

LOL. I know, but LOL anyway.

[Boo Augustus]

I am reminded of all those nature shows in which the mean predator eats the poor defenseless, Bambi-like creature. At the back of my mind, I'm always waiting for the camera crew to intervene and rescue the prey. But at least on television nature shows, it's, well, natural. I am going to spend the rest of the day wondering if the photographer rescued those poor ducklings. (Please note, my first reaction was, of course, to laugh hysterically (under my breath, anyway)).

[Mitai]

The photographer had better have rescued those ducklings. Work at a vet clinic for a while and suddenly young animal mishaps cease to be funny.

[Mrs. Bruce]

Hey, sewer alligators gotta eat too, ya know.

[Lairbo]

kibby
Not the nose but it still wasn't pretty.

mitai
Look at the size of the grating holes and then look at the size of the ducklings. Do the math, then lighten up.

[Dave Barry]

I'm with Lairbo. No ducklings were harmed in the taking of those photos.

[Lily]

Actually, ducklings Do fall into grates. They are very small and fit right in. So, even though they look bigger than the grate, they are just fluffy. And, unless a human passes by and rescues them, they perish in the next rainfall when the storm sewers fill up. They wash-up downstream wherever the storm sewers empty. Depending on your locality, it could be in the water treatment plant.

They have dead cats wash up there well. 'Cause when cats are close to death, they crawl away to someplace dark. Cats, however, do not lose their kittens down sewer grates.

School field-trips are very educational.

[thirdman]

Just for the record, although I am a Robert who lives in Austin, I am not the Robert in Austin that submitted these photos.

Thank you, and have a nice day. (tm)

[Jeff Meyerson]

I thought Axel's story was more disturbing, if it was related or not. The mother "took right off" when her babies fell down the sewer? What kind of mother duck is that? Someone call Duckling Child Welfare!

Actually, in the first sequence I thought she was just checking back to make sure Rudolph or Alvin or whatever the name of the one who always dawdles and tends to get left behind HADN'T fallen in, but I know it does happen.

[TIMMYD]

WHY DID THE DUCK CROSS THE ROAD?
TO GET TO THE OTHER......OH, WHOOPS

[gfunksizzle]

At my high school, back when I went to high school, geese would lay eggs on the roof of the building. When it came time to make their way to a pond, the mama goose just pushed them off the roof and onto the concrete below. This was three stories. They fell completely uninhibited, like your average Flugtag entrant. They were fine, somehow, but still. My point? Animals are stupid. Laugh at them.

[Axel]

Actually, there is a life lesson to be learned here.
Sometimes you're the duckling, and sometimes you're the storm drain. It's up to you to choose to be the storm drain.
Yup.

[kibby F5]

WOW! The Dave commented.

we're not worthy, we're not worthy

THANKS DAVE!

[Mahatma Kane Jeeves]

That's turrible

[Boo Augustus]

Lily, what else falls in storms drains and gets washed to the sewage treatment plant, sea, etc.?

[Boo Augustus]

When I was in about the first or second grade, my great grandmother knitted me a flock of chickens and chicks for Easter. While out with my mother, I accidentally dropped one into the basement lightwell at the local post office building. We didn't and/or couldn't retrieve it. It was very upsetting. Which reminds me, I need to tell my therapist this story.

[Lily]

Well, just about anything that can fit into the grate or in the storm drain, has shown up down stream.

What I found most disapointing was that the money that falls out of your pocket and rolls into the grate never turns up again. For some reason, it just lays down at the bottom of the grate and doesn't wash down. Must be too flat to catch a wave I guess.

What I found most disgusting was that the first series of "holding tanks" for "toilet waste" was literally covered with floating corn. It is not digested very well by humans and it floats.

A Sea Of Undigested Corn. WBAGNFARB

Have a nice lunch contemplating that.

[Dan]

I'm seeing a "Bandwidth exceeded" error. Does anyone have a copy of that picture that they could post/email?

[Graz]

Forbidden

Available bandwidth quota for this filesystem has been exceeded.
(/asw55/interesting pics/duck1.jpg)

Please, try again later.

Damn it.

[Dan]

Awesome, thanks, Axel.

[Lairbo]

Had the ducklings gone to a watery doom, would it have been called a sewercide?

[looney girl]

Please stop Lily!! I'm already home sick from work!! (Yes, I really am sick)

[LMC]

Axel, thank you so much for posting the happy ending! I was quite distressed at first.

I have ducks that winter over in my backyard (I don't know why they think Boston is far enough South for them -- it isn't for me! At least, not in February). They sit out there on the frozen ice in the stream and brrrr it makes me cold just to look at them.

Then in Spring when it floods I have a backyard that turns into a pond full of ducks. Pretty cool.

So, anyway, I like ducks and I'm glad the ending was happy. I did sort of laugh, though -- I may be a sap but I could see the funny side ...

[Varjak]

Having printed this out and shown it to some people at work, I've found reaction is split pretty much along gender lines. Everyone thinks it's horrible, but men at least see the humor involved and get a little laugh out of it. Women just look at it, stare, and then it registers, and *GASP!* it's the most horrible thing in the world.

[Blogchik]

Lily- LOL.

You're right, Undigested Corn WBAGNFARB.

[jamester]

Well, the only thing I know for sure is that Punky hasn't seen this yet.

[Austin Ross]

"Robert in Austin"? Hm.

[waterboy]

I share in lily's sewer plant traumas. I work in my town's sewer plant nearly every day. Holding Tank contents from toilets are indeed sickening, but what I find even worse is what comes from local restaurants. Some restaurants' frying grease goes in the sewer (when it doesn't stop up the sewage mains) and eventually ends up at the main holding tank at the sewer treatment plant where it must be removed, sometimes by actual people. In light of this, I encourage all bloglits to be very grateful for their wastewater treatment professionals--they deal qith your crap, so you don't have to.

[waterboy]

*with your crap, . . ."

[Lily]

Sewer Plant Tramas - WBAGNFARB

You don't even get the change that rolls into the grate. What a bummer.

I appreciate your dedication to duty.

[Lmd33]

:(

[Jeff Meyerson]

Waterboy: Holding Tank wbagnfarb, but then so would Wastewater Treatment Professionals.

[bbescuela]

I think that's part of the effort to breed a race of superintelligent ducks.

[D'Artagnan]

Consider this: perhaps the grate leads to the kitchen of a Chinese restaurant.

[Andrew]

Methinks the duckling in the third photo is the *last* one to cross. The photog just didn't post the photos of the other ones making it safely across the grate.

[marlodianne]

I admit I didn't find it funny, but horrible. My next thought was why didn't he save the duckies, instead of taking the damn pictures? The sick F*&K.

I showed it to my spouse, frowning. Who just said, oh, what again? My reply: Huh?

He told me a guy he grew up with was out for a walk and met up with this psycho-duck. It kept screaming and attacking his pant legs. He wasn't too happy, and was trying to get away quickly, but the duck only got more upset--wasn't biting him, but seemed realy determined to take his pants. Then he noticed he was only getting pulled in one direction. So he decided to cooperate, and lo, there is a grate...and stranded youngins below.
Once he saw them, mom stopped nipping, but she was pretty anxious until she had the family back on solid ground.

Me, I think the sloppy parenting is more likely the work of the male ducks, who were just looking after the brats for a few hours, but don't watch closely enough, and then oh sh!t...you just know the crap really begins when they get home...

Ms. duck: 'What do you MEAN you lost fluffytoo down a GRATE?'

Mr. duck: But--

Ms. duck: This neighbourhood has septic tanks! Where WERE you?

[Lily]

*in the voice of Adam West, (the only REAL Batman) as he waves a piece of paper dramatically in the air*

"A Sea of Undigested Corn...Hmmm
What... is... the... Riddler... trying... to... tell... us... Robin?"

*the voice of Burt Ward, (the only REAL Robin) as he paces around the Bat-Cave*

"I don't know Batman, when I go to the beach all I see are cigarette butts. It just doesn't make any sense." *Pounds fist into Robin-Gloved hand.* "Darn this Riddler!"

*Batman types furiously with his Bat-Gloved fingers on the keyboard of the Bat-Computer.*

*Robin* "Hurry Batman the ducklings are losing hope and it is GOING TO RAIN SOON!!!"

*Batman whirls away from the Bat-Computer, dramatically flourishing his Bat-Cape and raising a warning Bat-Gloved hand*

"Patience... is... a... virtue... Robin."

*The Bat-Computer dings to signal a query-match (or that the Bat-Muffins are done). Batman leaps to the Bat-Computer and grabs the Bat-Printout while Alfred gets the Bat-Muffins*

"That...that... FIEND!!!... The... ducklings... are... in... the... Waste-Water... Treatment... Facility... at... the... south... end... of... town...TO THE BAT-MOBILE, ROBIN!!!!

*Robin*'HOLY SH*T BATMAN!

[Cat Walker]

Happens all the time. Just throw a coat over the sewer grate that is probably across the road so the light from the opposite grate doesn't shine down into the series of tunnels down there (or the ducklings will run back and forth between the sewer grates, drawn by the light), get a net, and quietly fish them out. Don't give any of them back to mom until you have them all, or she'll leave with the first five and you'll be stuck with the rest.

If the net isn't long enough, use duck, I mean duct, tape, and a broom handle to make it longer.

This happens because the ducklings are too small to jump up the curb, and walk back and forth until they run into a storm sewer grate.

Fished out six batches this spring. No biggee. Mom stands there and quacks until someone notices.

[Lmd33]

:)

[ben.]

i hope they died.