Elizabeth Dixon was puttering in her front yard flower patch one Monday morning in early June when she witnessed an amazing spectacle. It was a duck like no duck she\u2019d ever seen before \u2014 a rusty-brown colored bird with a black belly, pink feet and bright orange beak.<\/p>\n
The odd duck was trailed by a troop of 10 or so tiny ducklings. Each 4-inches-tall, downy hatchling was black-and-white checkered, like a chessboard. The baby ducks waddled in a line. \u201cThat phrase \u2018ducks in a row\u2019 is a real thing,” Dixon said.<\/p>\n
Trouble was, Dixon immediately realized there was a problem. She lives on a street in Lakeview that runs right near the Orleans Canal, and it seemed to her that the mother duck and her hatchlings probably intended to reach the canal water.<\/p>\n
But they weren\u2019t going to make it, because the tall levee wall \u2014 decorated with concrete bunting by the late, great New Orleans artist Enrique Alf\u00e9rez \u2014 stood in their way. In fact, even the much shorter, knee-high wall along the edge of the street was enough to prevent the ducklings from getting to the water.<\/p>\n
The mission to save the wayward duck and hatchlings wasn\u2019t just a momentary pause in her day; Dixon discovered it was one of those small events that serve the soul.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The Harrison Avenue hazard<\/p>\n
If they kept heading north toward Harrison Avenue, they would end up in serious danger. Dixon said she didn\u2019t want to drive down Harrison the next day and see what happened when the parade of ducklings tried to cross four lanes of traffic. \u201cNot if I was able to stop it,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
She \u201ckind of sat there for a minute, saying \u2018What should I do?\u2019\u201d Dixon recalled.<\/p>\n
Dixon, 46, is twice as old as most of her fellow students at LSU New Orleans, formerly known as University of New Orleans. She\u2019s studying to be an accountant.<\/p>\n
Dixon has spent the past couple of decades as a stay-at-home mom, homeschooling her four kids. And she must have done a pretty good job, since two of her brood earned scholarships to attend Tulane and Columbia universities. Dixon still has two teenagers at home.<\/p>\n
Seeking safety in the strangest of places<\/p>\n
After a few seconds of mulling, Dixon made up her mind what to do about the imperiled ducks. She decided to shepherd the feathery family away from Harrison in the opposite direction, toward a geographic juncture where they might reach the water.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s a no-man\u2019s-land where a roaring highway overpass, a tar-coated railroad bridge and a brick pumping station join in a grimy jumble of infrastructure, litter and weeds. True, it didn\u2019t sound like a place that would be very hospitable to wildlife, but Dixon knew the levee wall ended at that point, so there was probably a way to reach the water.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Whistling ducks aren’t really ducks at all. They’re a different sort of fowl, common near the river uptown, rarer in Lakeview.<\/p>\n
(Photo courtesy Elizabeth Dixon)<\/p>\n
Uptown fowl<\/p>\n
Dixon became a sheepdog, guarding her flock as they scrambled along the edge of the street, emitting high-pitched peeping as they went. Now, they were heading in the right direction, and that was the important thing.<\/p>\n
Sometime in there, Dixon said, she realized there was a second adult duck in the picture. A few yards behind her, she was pursued by what she believed to be the father duck, who spread his wings \u201creal big\u201d in a threatening manner. Despite her good intentions, the father duck was clearly PO\u2019ed at Dixon. She was afraid he might nip her.<\/p>\n
Pretty rust-brown ducks like the ones Dixon found herself herding are mostly Uptown fowl. If you live around Audubon Park or the batture, you might see them all the time. But out by the Lake, where Dixon lives, not so much.<\/p>\n