One of the surprising things about living in this city is how much wild life there is. I don't mean what happens after dark in the trendier neighborhoods--although certainly those who want to walk on the wild side will find what they seek there--but animals who make their homes where we make ours.A case in point is two families of ducks who are raising their young this year in Outremont's Pratt Park. Maybe they've been there before, but this is the first year I've noticed. Lee saw them before I did, and counted one brood of seven ducklings and another of five in the thoroughly tamed ponds and streams of this less-than-an-acre park. When I took these pictures a couple of weeks ago, the young were still having trouble clambering out over the rocks lining the ponds, but they were seemingly thriving on the pond grass and whatever growing in the recirculating water.
Then they seemed to disappear, and we feared the worst since a number of predators live in close proximity--cats, racoons, humans. But this week they were back, looking even healthier. Along with the buzzing of night hawks in the twilight, they are symbols of the tenacity of life in urban settings.
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