What lies beneath?

Image: Ducks on the reflecting pool. Washington DC, March 2007.

You've got to love Tuesdays, because every Tuesday brings another Science Times segment. This week's offerings include a great article on Coral (Summary: If you've never seen a coral reef, then hurry up! They'll all be gone in 30 years.), a fascinating account of recent research on hand signals used by Chimps and Bonobos, and an excellent story on plankton, and how they might be used to combat global warming.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. First a puzzle:

Complete the following series.
dack, deck, ..., dock, ... .

If you said 'dick duck' then you'd be right. Just what the green-slippery-shit am I on about? Well, this was supposed to be a segueway into taking about duck dicks. What's that you say? Well, sometimes I happen to like things that are 'rather contrived', so there. Getting back to the point, yes, I did mean the reproductive organs of male mallards (and other duck species, I might add). It seems that there is more to the underside of a duck than meets the eye. Read on here.

- Mr. Ed