Nature is cruel

We watched these lovely ducklings and their Mum for some time, then the Mother led them to the wall and jumped over the edge, the babies all followed like lemmings some 15 feet down into the River Thames, then all the male ducks attacked and held the Mother down and started trying to mate with her, looked like they were drowning her… Max threw some mud and she got away, the babies looked so vulnerable, they joined another family for a while and eventually we saw 8 following the Mother away, there had been 9 :-(