Before the Splash

(Northern Shoveler)

Shovelers are remarkable, a living palette of vibrant blues and greens. They are also so easy to overlook along their breeding and migration stops because they are so very numerous—common, as if that’s a bad word. But if you pause the sweep of your binoculars to look, to really look, you might just mutter, “Wow.”

You might also notice how they form huge rafts, shoulder to shoulder. Some are heads up, paddling and stirring the bottom silt, bringing delectables up closer to the surface. Others are butts up, heads down, gobbling the swirling nutrients from the water. Watch. They take turns. Cooperation within their ranks. They are way ahead of us.