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Ducks swim in canal near Mai Chau
About this photograph
- Creator
- Margery H. Freeman
- Date created
- May 1997
- Location
- near Mai Chau, Vietnam
- License
- This photograph copyright ©1997. Terms of use
See this photograph in context
- Rice farming and rural life in Vietnam: Photographs and text tell the story of rice and rural life in Southeast Asia, with an emphasis on the highlanders, or Montagnards. (Page 10)
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Learn more
- Search LEARN NC for canals, ducks, farming, highlanders, houses, Mai Chau, rice, rural life, Vietnam, and wet rice.
In the classroom
- See our collection of articles on visual literacy for ideas on using photographs meaningfully in the classroom.
Ducks swim in a canal near Mai Chau. These brown, white, and black ducks with yellow bills are a domesticated variety raised by local rice farmers.
In many parts of Southeast Asia, farmers raise ducks and farm wet-rice fields in a mutually beneficial, or symbiotic, relationship. Duck droppings fertilize the water in which the rice grows. Ducks also eat the algae and other weeds that grow near the young rice plants. The ducks are herded away from the ripe rice when it is ready for harvest. The farmers ultimately eat both the mature rice and ducks.
