The links are working and thanks for fixing them!! the view is amazing!
A couple comments and questions
--so the Wood ducks are OK with nesting in the open and above land instead of over water? I always thought my lack of success had to do with too much activity around the nest and not having it in a safe enough space above the water. It sounds like the ducks in your area are fine with your location.
--watching the ducklings try to get out you can see that about 80% of their attempts are ineffective and most of the time they are looking every way EXCEPT the way where the hole is. It is as if they look at the metal mesh and that doesn't look right to them so they try all 3 of the other sides over and over. Would they find it easier if all 4 sides had mesh or some other grippy type of soft wood they could get their claws in? Or would it be easier if the side they need to climb out at was something that looked more like a natural inside of a tree rather than metal? Maybe some grippy bark attached inside the box on that side or on more than one side? I was thinking even if the side with the exit, and the two adjacent sides had something they could grip (and nothing on the side opposite the hole) they would have made it out easier as many times they got up the adjacent sides and tried to fly towards the hole.
obviously eventually they all got out so it may be a moot point.
--funny question. How does momma know when to stop calling them? Does she count them as they come out
Probably she just waits till she hears no more fussing in the box above and then figures they must be all out..
About where the ducks go after jump day that makes a lot of sense. I just see mallard ducks with the parade of young ones often hang around in the streams and ponds for a while and I would have thought their young are also vulnerable but wood ducks you don't see them in the open.
Seeing the amazing built in nurturing and ability to care for the young that is so powerfully instinctive always impresses me about the amazing blueprint that is found in their tiny brains.
