Something really amazing happened in
Downtown Spokane this week and I had to share the story
with you.
Some of you may know that my brother, Joel, is a loan
officer at Sterling Bank. He works downtown on the second story of a
two-story
office building, overlooking busy Riverside Avenue . Several
weeks ago he watched a mother
duck choose the cement awning outside
his window as the uncanny place to build a nest above the sidewalk.
The mallard laid nine eggs in a nest in the corner of the planter that
is perched over 10 feet in the air. She
dutifully kept the eggs warm
for weeks and Monday afternoon all of her nine ducklings
hatched.
Joel worri ed all night how the mamma duck was going
to get those babies safely off their perch in a busy,
downtown, urban
environment to take to water, which typically happens in the first 48
hours of a duck
hatching. Tuesday morning, Joel came to work and
watched the mother duck encourage her babies to the
edge of the perch
with the intent to show them how to jump off!
The
mother flew down below and started quacking to her babies above. In his
disbelief Joel watched as the
first fuzzy newborn toddled to the edge
and astonishingly leapt into thin air, crashing onto the cement
below.
My brother couldn't watch how this might play out. He dashed out
of his office and ran down the stairs to the
sidewalk where the first
obedient duckling was stuporing near its mother from the near fatal
fall.
Joel looked up. The second duckling was getting ready
to jump! He quickly dodged under the awning while the
mother duck
quacked at him and the babies above. As the second one took the plunge,
Joel jumped forward
and caught it with his bare hands before it hit the
cement. Safe and sound, he set it by the mamma and the other
stunned
sibling, still recovering from its painful leap.
One by
one the babies continued to jump to join their anxious family below. Each
time Joel hid under the
awning just to reach out in the nick of time as
the duckling made its free fall. The downtown sidewalk came
to a
standstill. Time after time, Joel was able to catch the remaining 7 and
set them by t heir approving mother.
At this
point Joel realized the duck family had only made part of its dangerous
journey. They had 2 full blocks
to walk across traffic, crosswalks,
curbs, and pedestrians to get to the closest open water, the Spokane
River
The onlooking office secretaries then joined in,
and hurriedly brought an empty copy paper box to collect
the
babies.
They carefully corralled them, with the mother's approval, and
loaded them up into the white cardboard
container. Joel held the
box low enough for the mom to see her brood. He then slowly
navigated through the
downtown streets toward the Spokane
River , as the mother waddled behind and kept her babies
in sight.
As they
reached the river, the mother took over and passed him, jumping into
the river and quacking loudly.
At the water's edge, the Sterling
Bank office staff then tipped the box and helped shepherd the babies
toward
the water and to their mother after their adventurous
ride.
All nine darling ducklings safely made it into
the water and paddled up snugly to mamma duck. Joel said
the
mom swam in
circles, looking back toward the beaming bank workers, and proudly
quacking as if to say,
'See, we did it!
Thanks for all the help!
Thankfully, one of the secretaries had a digital camera
and was able to capture most of it (except the
actual mid-air catching)
in a series of attached photographs.Please join me in celebrating my
brother--
The Downtown Duck Hero!
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