Wood Duck, Snapping Turtle egg laying, and more

To date there have been far fewer Wood-Ducks than last year. Maybe they are just late arriving?
But here are a few shots of 1 of the 4 at Sheriff Creek today.

The Mallard family of ten offspring has been reduced to 8 with 2 missing in action. Suspect Snapping Turtle got em.

 

Found this interesting. Feather stuck to nesting box is too large to be one of the resident Swallow's. Wonder if it came off a predator who swooped down for a kill. Maybe too fanciful an idea, but it is late to be feathering the nest now and how would it get stuck there?

Here is a duckling power boat charge for a bug.


Lastly, Golden-eyes. Males first then females.

 

And a Mallard removing water. 

The shake starts at the head.

 

Now the Snapping Turtle egg laying:

On the approach to the Sheriff Creek Beaver dam I came across a dozen abandoned "pits"  only 5 of which are shown here.

Then on the slope at the very edge of the dam:

 

oblivious to everything. Lay there stock still.

 

When I returned an hour and a half later. 

This nest was vacant and another, new pit on the path was occupied.

 

I am unable to say if this is the same turtle having just changed nests or whether it is another beast altogether.

Nest on the slope did not look as if it had been properly covered if in fact eggs were laid. But that might have been just sloppy housekeeping. Looking at the many photos I took to see if there were different identifying marks didn't help either.