Where the Ducks Walk on the Fish

I grew up going to Linesville, Pennsylvania to feed ducks and fish.  My grandfather would take my cousin and me, buy bags of bread for a quarter, and let us run up and down the spillway, tossing pieces of bread to the huddled masses of wide mouthed carp begging at the water's surface.  Sometimes ducks would waddle across the road of fish and snatch it from their mouths.  There was a hierarchy on the lake.

My parents now live near Linesville, which gives my dad the opportunity to carry on the bagged bread tradition with his own grandchildren, my children, who always eagerly anticipate the drive across the water and through neighboring towns to the road-side shed where bread can now be purchased for $1 on the honor system.

The Spillway has changed since my childhood.  Where once there was a run-down parking lot and small bridge with poured concrete platform, there is now a pristine cement walk-way complete with gift shop and ice cream vending, railings to keep children from drowning, and environmentally friendly plastic bag disposal (if such a thing is possible).

Also new is the addition of Canadian Geese who have taken their place above the mallards in the hierarchy.  Nobody wants to mess with a goose.

Jonah with his $1/loaf bread

Maeryn atop the spillway bridge, unchanged since my own childhood.