Like a sequel to the award winning children’s story, “Make Way for Ducklings,” residents of one Great Bend neighborhood took part in a duck tale of their own over Memorial Day weekend.  
Kathy Melder McNett spotted a family of ducks, a mother leading 10 ducklings, traveling along Williams Street Saturday morning, and decided to follow them to see where they went.   Along the way, a driver came close to running the family over.  The mother duck then hunkered down in the tall grass of one property on the 2100 block of Williams with her brood.  McNett contacted the zoo to see if they belonged there, but the zoo was not missing any hatched ducklings.  She then contacted the Golden Belt Humane Society, which dispatched a representative to round up the ducks and move them to a safer location.  McNett waited for their arrival, and photographed events as they unfolded.  
Meanwhile, the children of Audra Cross were riding their bikes, and stopped to watch as the Humane Society attempted to round up the ducklings and their mother.  The Cross children did their part to warn traffic and passersby of the rescue attempt.  The ducklings were rounded up, but the mother duck continued to elude capture, Cross said.
She and her children took turns using a duck call to successfully lure her to the babies, but she would not be coaxed into the crate.  The last three attempts, a neighborhood cat got into the act, and scared the mother away.  McNett was able to locate the owner who happily put the cat indoors so the rescue could continue.  
“It was an amazing feeling to witness the coming together of people along this block as well as listening to caring concerns of people out walking or driving by who stopped to inquire what was taking place,” McNett said.   
Heather Acheson, director of the Golden Belt Humane Society, said they even parked the Humane Society vehicle and left the door open for a time in hopes she might hop inside, but to no avail.  Later in the day, the mother duck was continuing to circle and call for her babies, but would not land.  She was never caught, and some residents said she could still be seen in search of them the next day.
Acheson said Tuesday the ducklings were placed right away at a farm south of Great Bend.  
“They will need to be under a heat lamp, as they’re still a little young to be on their own,” she said.  “They will be find.  They have a good place to stay now.”