Winter Ruddy Ducks on the Hudson River

incidental naturalist

The fierce wind sliced through my jacket as I stepped outside the door of my apartment building. Winter had wrapped its cloak around the North East of the United States. I had arrived in the country in the steamy heat of August, but now, in December, the mercury was in free-fall. My morning commute took me along the edge of the Hudson River, where I take the ferry from Hoboken across to Manhattan. On this hostile morning I noticed a group of little black dots bobbing in the slack water beside an old pier. The following weekend I reached for my binoculars and bird book. The little black dots were my first ever sighting of Ruddy Ducks.

Look closely – can you see the little black dots in front of the old pier supports