Duck, duck, duck, duck

Sunday the 31 of August, 2008, Molesy Lock by Hampton Court bridge saw the start of the third Great British Duck Race.

250,000 small blue rubber ducks were raced along the Thames to raise money for various charities including NSPCC, WaterAid, MacMillan Nurses, and Cancer Research UK to name but a few.

Not only did this raise over £100,000 before the race but it also set a new Guinness world record for duck racing.

Photo credit: AFP/Shaun Curry

Tough Duck

(via)

The duck gets washed

Chewy has had his Stuffy since he was just a little baby duckling. They are best of friends and Chewy drags Stuffy all over the yard to share in the fun.

See what happens when Stuffy gets cleaned up.

The story of Nebbeline

I chanced across an excellent photoset at Flickr, The story of Nebbeline (Ms. Freaky Beaky), which is the story of a duck with a very unusual beak.

The photographer, Cynthia, aka tuxette, lives in Oslo, Norway.

She met Nebbeline (nebb is the Norwegian word for beak) on a very cold, snowy Sunday in January while feeding the other ducks and taking photos.

Nebbeline's beak is very short and curved up, and her lovely pink tongue sticks out. She looks like she was born with a birth defect. The duck version of cleft palette, maybe?

Here's a closeup of that beak:


While she was slightly smaller than the other ducks, Nebbeline did not look unfed. Still, Cynthia felt concerned and has brought special treats to feed the duck, such as crickets from a local pet shop.

It looks like Nebbeline enjoys finger food. According to Cynthia, she even enjoys the fingers!