Common Merganser with chicks

This is a Common Merganser with three of her offspring. This duck typically lays 9-12 eggs in a season but because ducks commonly lay eggs in more than one nest, a mother can have well over 12 in her original brood. I read an article on Audubon where one merganser was spotted with over 75 chicks! These very large broods are likely the result of a duckling getting separated from its mom, and following another merganser because she looks a lot like the mom he or she is familiar with. Since mergansers can't tell their own chicks from other broods the female may take on several chicks - or even entire broods. I saw this mom many times over the season, and she had a conservative group of 6 chicks that she taught to dive and catch food. By comparison, that sounds easy, but she had her hands full keeping the chicks out of trouble!