{"id":204009,"date":"2026-03-14T03:12:07","date_gmt":"2026-03-14T03:12:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/204009\/"},"modified":"2026-03-14T03:12:07","modified_gmt":"2026-03-14T03:12:07","slug":"neighbors-worried-about-safety-water-quality-at-heritage-duck-pond-park","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/204009\/","title":{"rendered":"Neighbors worried about safety, water quality at Heritage Duck Pond Park"},"content":{"rendered":"

SAN ANTONIO \u2013 If you ask just about any kid, the best part of Heritage Duck Pond Park<\/a> is easy to guess: the ducks.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey are the central attraction to Heritage, and that\u2019s why a lot of people come here,\u201d said John Burciaga, president of the Heritage Neighborhood Association. <\/p>\n

Ducks have been a Heritage community staple for years, but the growing number of birds at the park has raised safety and health concerns<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s just an overpopulation of turtles and ducks,\u201d Burciaga said. \u201cThat adds extra pollutants to this body of water.\u201d<\/p>\n

District 4 Councilman Edward Mungia said he\u2019s aware of the overpopulation and pollution, and is working with the Parks and Recreation Department<\/a>. <\/p>\n

KSAT 12 reached out to the San Antonio River Authority<\/a> about Heritage Duck Pond Park, which said staff visited the park in the past \u201cto observe conditions after concerns were raised about the bird population.\u201d <\/p>\n

\u201cDuring that visit, staff noted visible signs of a heavy bird presence and droppings around the pond area, which contribute to localized water quality concerns, in this case, the presence of excessive algae and low dissolved oxygen levels,\u201d the spokesperson said in an email.<\/p>\n

Mungia said what people feed to the ducks is part of the problem. He said giving them human food, like bread, actually does more harm than good. <\/p>\n

\u201cJust feed them the food that we have here for them,\u201d Mungia said. \u201cThat\u2019s the best thing for them, and it\u2019s the best thing for the pond.”<\/p>\n

Mungia said he wants to add bird feeders back to this park and signs about what you should feed the ducks.<\/p>\n

The councilman said it\u2019s also possible the city humanely relocates some of the animals here to help with overpopulation.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe wanna make sure that it\u2019s a safe place for everybody,\u201d Mungia said. <\/p>\n

Burciaga said he thinks creating engaging education tools is the way to reach our community, suggesting coloring books as a potential educational method.<\/p>\n

Read also:<\/p>\n

Copyright 2026 by KSAT – All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SAN ANTONIO \u2013 If you ask just about any kid, the best part of Heritage Duck Pond Park…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":204010,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[66583,2327,80431,1006,82,84,83,2098],"class_list":["post-204009","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-antonio","tag-edward-muniga","tag-environment","tag-heritage-duck-pond-park","tag-outdoors","tag-san-antonio","tag-san-antonio-headlines","tag-san-antonio-news","tag-west-side"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/204009","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=204009"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/204009\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/204010"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=204009"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=204009"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=204009"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}