During breakup it is sometimes hard to find the critters as they are dealing with the soft snow and sucking mud and that is EVERYWHERE! So what is a wildlife photographer to do? I have spent at least 4 out of the last 7 evenings driving around trying to find some of my outdoor targets and they have eluded me completely. So out of frustration I went for a sure thing.

Anchorage has a fantastic parks system and most of those parks have lakes or streams running through them. Which creates these havens for water fowl especially because people feed these birds. While this may be a fun activity for us and our children it generates all kinds of issues for these birds. One of the major issues it creates is that the birds get comfortable being fed and don't follow their natural habits of migration when winter weather sets in. So because of this we have parks that have water fowls, mainly ducks, year around and they are easily photographed.

BD126Female mallard duck posing in a snowbank.

My family and I went to one of these parks, specifically the Westchester Lake park. There are always a flock of ducks wandering around and that day was not different. My kids and I enjoyed sitting close by watching the ducks. They were very animated and quite the characters. My kids were giggling when I started focusing in on one male mallard duck and then directly behind me a female duck started quacking incessantly. My son told me it was the male duck's mate and she was jealous. Although this wasn't my favorite way to go about a photo shoot I enjoyed spending some time with my kids and watching the birds.

BD127Male mallard duck on a snow bank.