Nature often provides us with unforgettable moments and stories to tell which, if not documented, would be hard to believe. Laurie Wolf, an American photographer living in Jupiter, Florida, was lucky enough to see an owl that, by pure chance, had made its nest in a place in her garden.
One day, the woman’s attention was caught by something else that was fluttering and was feathery, unidentified.
#1
image credit: Facebook / Laurie Wolf
At first glance, Laurie thought the other creature in the nest was a little owl, but as she got closer, she discovered it was something else a duckling.
A little duckling, identified as a specimen from Aix Sponsa , stood next to the owl and gazed out of the nest. In fact, as sweet as the scene may seem, an expert in the world of birds of prey advised Laurie Wolf to remove this duckling from the owl’s nest, as the latter sometimes feeds on the duck’s young. The advice was therefore to try to “capture” the duckling, then take it to a shelter that would take care of it. But soon after, the duckling abandoned the nest of its own accord, moving away towards a pond, possibly managing to intercept the mother’s call.
#2
image credit: Facebook / Laurie Wolf
The fact that an owl “raises” a duck is not as rare as it seems – “it is not commonly documented, but it does happen, for sure”, said Christian Artuso, director from Bird Studies Canada. Sometimes female ducks will lay an egg or two in the nest of another, usually another duck, or another closely related species.
Although we know that this is a common occurrence, the frequency with which these events occur has not yet been established with certainty.
source used: nationalgeographic.com