Boyd Matson | Wild Chronicles

ducks set up housekeeping at national geographic

Usually we have to travel to some remote or exotic locaton to capture good wildlife footage at National Geographic.  But for the month of April we simply had to walk out the door of the building and into the courtyard to get all the cute animal pictures we wanted.  A mother mallard duck and her ten ducklings set up housekeeping at National Geographic after Ms. Mallard apparently decided she wanted a place with a pool.  We have one.  So the kids got their first swimming lessons in our decorative pond.  Ever attuned to the needs of the animal kingdom, our engineers built a ramp to help the youngsters get in and out of the water.

Well after three weeks of being the center of attention the ducks have opted for more privacy and mom moved the family down the street to a nearby park.  I’m on a plane tomorrow to go look for more typically National Geographic animal subjects.  I’m headed to the Central African Republic hoping to get video of forest elephants and lowland gorillas.