A day for families to help wood ducks

Sunday, Feb. 23, was a busy day for the 21st annual Wood Duck Box Building Day as a multitude of families stopped by the Knights of Columbus Hall in New Prague to make duck houses.

“We think we’ll be out of houses before it’s over,” said Andrew Harms, the new chapter president of the Scott-Le Sueur Waterfowlers. Around 11:30 a.m. 270 of the 300 duck houses had been built and taken home by families. “It’s been a busy day, but that’s what we like,” said Harms.

The annual event allows youth 16 and under to build duck houses and take them home for free. The shelters provide ducks with a nesting spot to lay their eggs and raise their ducklings.

Harms said they had people waiting to get in when they began at 9:30 a.m. For most of the time there was a line out the door with an average wait time of 30 minutes.

This was the first year for the group to be running the annual event under a new name. Formerly they had been the Scott-Le Sueur Chapter of the Minnesota Waterfowl Association (MWA), which had been dissolved on September 30, 2019. The 170 local members decided to continue with their mission of maintaining habitat for waterfowl hunting in the area and teach children about nature.

The event draws families each year, with some attending often.

“We come every year,” said Jamie Stasney of Montgomery. She was watching her daughter Laynie, build a duck house, with help from her uncle Pete Stasney. “My husband usually helps, but we had a fishing trip planned this year.”

“We’ve been here before,” said Teresa Hopke of New Prague, who was there with her three children, Vivia, Taya and Brexten. “We have a couple duck houses in our backyard.”

Among the volunteers were...

To see more on this story pick up the February 27, 2020 print edition of The New Prague Times.