Northjersey.com's John Ensslin just posted a podcast about Central Park's resident Mandarin Duck, who just might be the most-famous waterfowl in the world at this point.

He went to see the duck at the pond near 60th St. and Fifth Avenue, and interviewed me for the podcast at the Celery Farm two days ago.

You can listen here. I arrive several minutes in.... (Thanks to Fred Virrazzi for the photo above.)

This just might be the end of Mandarin Duck posts for while. (He has to compete with the Christmas tree in Rockefeller Center.)

At my urging, The Record posted my Mandarin Duck column last Friday, almost a week early but waited till its normal print schedule to run it. 

I updated it on Monday to reflect the fact that the duck had been seen in Edgewater and North Bergen.

You can read the column in today's Better Living section, or online here.

To see where the Mandarin duck is being spotted, check out David Barrett's Twitter feed here. His Manhattan Bird Alert was first to report the released duck's presence, back in October.

Thanks to Fred Virrazzi for the photos.

It turns out that Central Park's famed Mandarin Duck was seen in Edgewater and North Bergen last month -- the latter at a spot where another male Mandarin was seen in 2010.

I updated my column, which The Record had posted here, and The Record did its own story to boot -- here.

Thanks to Fred Virrazzi for the photo above (note the band on the duck's leg.)

I started my posts from Louisiana with a little mystery, so I thought I'd end with one as well.

Can you ID the bird above? Why is this type of duck noteworthy?

Not to be gross, but a friend pointed me to what we think is Black Bear scat by Phair's Pond off Green Way.

Any thoughts (serious or otherwise)? It is near the woods.

(I know, I should have put  a quarter next to it for a size comparison, but gotta draw the line somewhere.)

More info on the topic, if you really want to know, is here.

A post on how to gauge the size of a bear by its tracks is here.