Turtles and Ducks

Here in the immediate southern Maryland area, we had a snowstorm leaving six inches of snow three days before this image was taken. It was the fourth accumulating snow that hadn't melted off because the temperatures were so cold. Two days earlier, the temperature had gotten down to 6° overnight. Despite the cold, look at the big honkin' turtle basking near the Mallard duck in this photo. He is almost as big as the duck!

Then I started looking more carefully and discovered there were turtles basking all over the place. The "island" is actually the rhizome from lily pads that have been there for years and years. Thirty or forty feet to the right of this photo is the edge of the ice that covers almost the remainder of the entire pond. Yet, if you look in the water you can see the shoots from the lily pads getting ready to emerge. Even the turtles are ready for winter to be over.

Here are other photos showing the multitude of turtles that had come up out of the mud to bask in the sun. On one "island" I counted sixteen!

In one of the funniest "out-of-the-blue" lines in a movie, Billy Bob Thornton's neurotic character in the movie, "Bandits," wakes up out of a sound sleep and, as though still dreaming, exclaims in a loud voice, "Beavers and ducks!" Funny movie. It also stars Bruce Willis and Cate Blanchett in kind of a screwball comedy. "Turtles and ducks," would have worked too.