Good samaritans come to the aid of local duck family

by Dave Davis
(Steveston, BC Canada)

On June 1st, good samaritan Colin Beadle of Steveston happened upon a mini-drama unfolding in a water-filled ditch as onlookers watched. It seems that a family of ducklings got washed into a storm drain with no escape until Colin jogged up to the curious scene. Here's the touching story in Colin's words, which can also be viewed at on Colin's blog at http://colinbeadle.blogspot.com/2009/06/steveston-baby-duck-rescue-team.html.

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Here's something I've been dying to write about all week. On Monday, June 1st, I was out for a late evening jog. I run the same 3km route almost every day, and I really enjoy it because there's always a chance I'll spot some local wildlife. In fact, it's usually for this reason that I stay motivated enough to go for a run each day.

On that evening, when I got to the end of No. 2 Rd I made a right turn and started running parallel to the marina. There's a ditch along this route that is full of nesting ducks and swans. I noticed a man and woman were staring down into a storm drain at one end of the ditch. There was a female mallard duck going nuts right in front of them. I stopped to find out what was going on.

I asked the couple if everything was ok, and they told me that a family of ducklings had been sucked down into the storm drain. If you looked through the grate you could see them crying and swimming in circles below. Up above the mother was desperately calling to them trying to get them out. I could tell these two people cared a lot about animals and were willing to do anything to help this family of ducks. I care a lot about animals, too, so I wanted to help them with their cause. We worked together and hauled the grate off the top of the storm drain. We put it down on the side of the ditch and took another look into the storm drain.

Here's where it got complicated... We counted about five ducklings at the bottom of the drain. But, there were another two ducklings in a very narrow pipe about halfway down. At this point a few more people had stopped to see what we were doing. They also wanted to help. Awesome! My faith in the human race was starting to be restored. I had no idea great people like this lived in my neighborhood.

We got a bucket and some string and started lowering it into the drain to hoist out the ducklings. But, this didn't work at all... the ducklings were too scared to go near the bucket and kept retreating deeper into the storm drain. We tried this for a few minutes before I realized what I had to do.

Standing there in my running shorts (which are just like a bathing suit), I pulled off my shoes and socks. I stuck my iPod into one of my shoes and attempted to climb down into the storm drain. This was the only way those baby ducks were ever going to get out of there. I just hoped I wasn't going to get stuck down there with them. I almost reached the bottom when I realized I had no idea how deep the water inside was. This made me more than a little nervous. I figured I'd better test it before I jumped in, so the couple pulled me out. Luckily, they lived close by and had a step ladder. I'm a pretty good swimmer, but trying to rescue baby ducks while keeping yourself afloat in a sewer is a whole other thing.


We lowered the step ladder into the drain and measured the water at about waist deep. There was too many pipes in the way to fully open the step ladder, so they held it tight against the wall of the drain and I climbed back down. The drain was about 8 to 9-feet deep. The storm drain smelled, it was cold, and it was full of spiders. Well, not exactly full of spiders, but there was a lot of them. When I hit bottom, I could see the baby ducks. They were frantically trying to get out of the sewer and away from me. I was going to have to be quick if I wanted to catch them. They were so confused they kept swimming circles around me. I grabbed one of them. And then another. The couple up above lowered the bucket down to me and I started dropping them in. We pulled all five ducklings out in a very short time. But, there were still two more inside that narrow pipe.

I looked into the pipe and could see them both. But, the pipe was longer than my arm, and I couldn't fit inside it. I tried to reach them, but each time I put my arm into the pipe they swam deeper into the drain. That's when a few of the people who had been watching suggested I try again with some of their kitchen utensils. A woman who also lived nearby ran and got her kitchen ladel and strainer. She sacrificed them both for the cause. The ladle was too small of a scoop, so we couldn't get the ducklings with it. The strainer ended up being our secret weapon. After hundreds of failed scoops, I finally got the last two ducklings with that strainer. We did it!

We watched as the final duckling raced towards its mother. The mother waited patiently until every last baby duck was with her. Nature truly is an amazing thing.

One of the people watching put his cellphone up to my ear (I would have held onto it with my hands, but they were covered in sewer water) and asked if I wanted to call my wife to let her know I was ok. At this point it had been over an hour since I left home and I'm usually only out jogging for 20 minutes. I told Natsuko I'd be home soon and that I'd want to go straight into the shower. I smelled bad. I mean, REALLY bad. Even after I'd taken a long hot shower I was certain I could still smell the inside of that storm drain on me. YUCK!

The neighbours all got together and put a mesh covering over the drain so no more baby ducks will get pulled into it. I contacted the city and let them know about the drain, so hopefully they're ok with the mesh that was put over it. And if they aren't then they can build a better cover themselves.

The saddest part of this story is that I didn't get to find out the names of any of the people that helped rescue the ducks. I wanted to give a proper thanks to all of them, but I was standing on the side of a ditch covered in sewer water. I just wanted to go and get cleaned up. I waved to all of them and jogged back home. Hopefully I'll bump into them again. Or maybe they'll be surfing the net and come across this post. Thank you so much for your help.