Eider ducks recovering at Atlantic Wildlife Institute

Roughly 10 sea ducks were killed on the Tantramar Marsh near Sackvillelast week, but the Atlantic Wildlife Institute managed to save two of them.

Eider ducks make their way to their wintering grounds annually and often use the marsh as a crossing, but several members of the flock were caught in power lines.

"It's a good place to cross but you have these obstacles obviously that get in the way with these large transmission lines," said Pam Novak of AWI in Sackville. "They're always going to cause trouble for these birds especially when flying low, and in flocks.

Shift - NB6:46Ducks and power lines don't mix

Two eider ducks are recovering at the Atlantic Wildlife Institute after hitting a power line. 10 other ducks in the same area did not survive.

One of the birds was found by a biologist who lives along the marsh. He saw the duck waddling down a path, injured.

The birds get caught by their neck or the tip of their wing, which is what happened to the two birds recovering at the institute.

Novak says birds getting caught in the lines happens on a "pretty regular basis."

"Another live male was trying to swim away in a ditch. Obviously he was injured so were able to catch him as well and bring him back to our facility," said Novak.

The ducks can weigh abourtwo kilogramsand are built for diving into deep water. When they're on land they have a harder time taking off.

"They feed off the bottom of our water systems and are not designed to land on land or take off from land. When they go down even uninjured, they're in a pretty precarious situation," said Novak.

Novak said that she and her team found more carcasses going through the marshes.

"Tantramar marshes are a great birding area, but there's lots of birds of prey there's sightings of golden eagles, bald eagles, hawks,short-eared owls."

"It put the bigger predator birds in jeopardy too," she said.

The two birds are recovering at the institute, but it's too soon to say whether or not they will be able to be released back into the wild.