There are a couple of funny things about this photo.
First, if you don’t recognize the scene, this bold mallard is apparently taking selfies on top of a Peregrine Falcon nesting platform. This is especially dangerous as the Peregrine Falcon is so fond of eating duck, its old-timey, colloquial street name is actually “The Duck Hawk.” How this bold mallard came to find itself up here on my Peregrine Prey Cam is anybody’s guess. But this photo is from early April and taken while Jo Durt & Kids on Grass were laying their eggs. Probably the worst possible time for such a stunt.
The second funny thing is how long it took me to find this photo for you. Kathy & I have seven cams at out at seven nests, taking millions of photos of the activity there. While these photos are so numerous they need to be processed by a machine brain, whenever we pull the cards we just can’t help but randomly peek to see what kind of stuff we might have captured. America’s Bravest Duck was one of those I just found by luck. I meant to save it somewhere special but I never did.
And then for some reason I became obsessed with finding it and wasted an embarrassing number of hours pouring through gigabytes of Peregrine Prey Project photos just to share it with you.
So I really, really hope you enjoy “America’s Bravest Duck!”
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And in case you’re curious, yes, our machine correctly identified this photo as “prey.” And special thanks to photographer and tireless raptor volunteer Randy G. Lubischer for expertly and effortlessly captioning “America’s Bravest Duck”
Readings From The Northside 
Wow! That really is a brave duck!! I loved the story and appreciated your hours spent finding the photo! Got this as I was going through my own zillion raptor photos before doing my Nest Story reports!! LOL
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🙂
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I appreciate and understand the time. I spent a good part of today looking for Clark Kent baby pics of him and his sibs from 2018. But you found this pic!!! So worth the time to share it and the story with us. As always, thanks! I am choosing to believe this duck is still with us. I will probably be back at looking for Clark’s sib, Diana Prince, on external drives tomorrow, lol.
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Haha, you absolutely understand! Plovers are the hardest because they are too tiny sometimes to even see in the thumbnail
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Great story! Did he live to tell the tale?
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We’ll never know for sure, but I think so
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I think this is the latest viral challenge for Mallards—saw it on Duck TikToc.
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don’t you mean DukTok?
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Lol, may be the bravest but not the smartest!
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There is a very fine line between brave and stupid. Ducks are sweet. I’m going with “brave”
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Just wondering I have lived in my house 35 years I have 2 hawks that moved in to a tree they live now during the day on my deck an eat I can’t go out . I love to watch but would love also sit on my deck help
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Most likely there is a nest forming near by. Keep a sharp eye, try to locate it, then enjoy it more than your porch!
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