Ducklings, people! Ducklings! The baby duckies have started hatching on North Creek. I love this time of the year.

Misha was too busy with sunbeams to give a crap about what I was up to, and the weather was the perfect shade of warm, so I headed out down North Creek on Sunday. There weren’t many ducks out, but I did see a couple of mommy ducks with kiddos. The babies were mostly off exploring by themselves, while the moms kept an eye on them from a small distance.

I got few drakes and some childless females to join me for lunch. A crow joined in, and it was all quite pastoral and lovely. Then I wandered off to the water treatment plant to see if their boardwalk was open, and found goslings on the bank there.

There were two – this one was living a pretty independent existence between the two pairs of adult geese. The other was hanging with Mom while Dad stood sentry.

On my way back to the creek, a bunny ran alongside the boardwalk, pausing long enough to pose for a great photo.

I don’t often see them in the daytime, so that was nice.

On my way back down the creek, a squirrel got all kinds of curious about me. It fled into a tree at my approach, but stopped and inspected me once it felt safe. I wish I’d still had some food on me! Look at dat face!

It went all around the tree, checking me out from various angles. Tremendously cute!

There was another one further down the way that struck a pose in the crotch of a tree and was kind enough to hold it until I’d unlimbered the camera and got a shot.

Lookit dat foot!

There’s lots more photos of all the cute critters on Flickr. Enjoy!