If you’ve spent any time riding the back roads around Ubud, you’ve almost certainly met them. Not the monkeys, not the dogs, the ducks!
Hundreds, and what sometimes feels like thousands of them, waddling purposefully across the road in a noisy, feathery traffic jam. Scooters stop. Cars stop. Everyone stops. And somewhere in the middle of the chaos is a calm Balinese farmer, stick in hand, gently (or not so gently) persuading his flock to move from one rice paddy to the next.
These aren’t just cute photo opportunities. The ducks are hard-working professionals. For centuries, Balinese rice farmers have used them as a natural pest-control and fertiliser service. The ducks happily gobble up insects, weeds, snails and leftover grain in the paddies. In return, they leave behind free organic fertiliser. It’s an elegant, low-tech system that has helped keep Bali’s famous subak rice-farming tradition going for generations - long before anyone invented chemical sprays or plastic packaging.
So when you find yourself on a backroad on your scooter waiting while a river of ducks flows past, resist the urge to honk or try to sneak through. Just stop, laugh, enjoy the moment and take lots of pictures!! Watch the local expert do his job with the kind of patience most of us can only dream of. Take a moment to appreciate that this little procession is part of a farming method that has sustained communities here for a very long time.
In a world that seems to move faster every year, the ducks refuse to hurry. And somehow, that feels exactly right for Ubud.
Next time you meet the flock, smile, wave at the farmer, and remember: you’re not stuck in traffic. You’re briefly sharing the road with some of Bali’s oldest and most reliable farm workers.