The Haines Borough Police department answers calls for animals fairly often. Last year they got over 200 canine complaints. This weekend they had their first report of a suspected domestic duck.
Tracy Mikowski is the shelter Manager for Haines Animal Rescue Kennel, or HARK. When she got a call from Haines Borough Police Dispatch on Sunday afternoon, she thought they would ask her to collect a dog.
“Yeah, dispatch calls on my day off and I anticipate it’s because someone found a dog,” she said. “So when Max called I thought he said a dog, but he said, ‘No, it’s a duck.’ And I said, ‘Okay, be right there.’”
Two young women found the duck at large on Main Street and took him to the police. They called Mikowski. By the time she got there the women were gone, but she says the duck was waddling around the dispatch office. HARK is closed on Sunday and for Martin Luther King Day, so she tucked him in her coat and took him home.
The duck is friendly but not housebroken. Mikowski is no stranger to the needs of domestic fowl.
“I have chickens so I have lots of good food and that sort of thing. He was really hungry and thirsty. So he had a big dinner and a whole bowl of water and crashed out,” she said.
This is HARK’s first duck. Mikowski says he’s a bit thin. She plans to move him to the Shelter where he will have more room–and benefit from heated floors in the kennel area. She plans to fill a kiddie pool with water so the duck feels at home. He’s lodging comfortably at her house until the shelter reopens.
Mikowski posted the lost duck on Facebook and some locals replied that he’s been hanging out downtown since November. Mallards are common in the area, but Mikowski knows that this isn’t a wild duck.
“He looks like a mallard,” she said. “The domestic version is called rouen. They have the same colorations, but they’re a bit larger. Obviously he’s very friendly and used to people, so I don’t believe that he’s a wild duck.”
Mikowski grew up on a wild game park with lots of ducks, so she would know the difference. She says a number of people in the area keep ducks, but no one has come forward to claim him yet. She says she isn’t worried though–several people offered to add him to their flocks.