Dabo Duck Phenomenon
If you have been in a 10 mile radius of campus in the past few months you have heard of Dabo Duck. If you for some reason live under a rock and have not, he is a duck that has inhabited the reflection pond. The students have become infatuated with him and he might as well be the second mascot of Clemson. Dabo was previously someone’s pet and was dropped off at the pond.
He has been the star of the various Clemson Snapchat accounts that have come and gone as well as being mentioned on Yik Yak countless times a day. He is pretty much always located in or around the reflection pond and there is always a crowd of students watching him on nice days. He even received 3% of the votes in the student body president vote in February.
While writing this article, the top 3 “Hot” yaks on Yik Yak were all about Dabo and the borderline stalker love for him.
This past week, a female duck has arrived and the student body has named her Tilly. It has been joked about for months that we should find him a mate and it seems that our wish was granted! Someone apparently adopted her from a shelter and brought her here for Dabo. Hopefully, things will work out between them, because I mean come on how great would it be to see a bunch of ducklings in the pond?
While they both seem really relaxed about always having people around, we do have to remember that the ducks are actual living ducks and not toys to amuse us between classes. Avoid trying to feed them anything because it can make them sick. They should be able to find their own food that is healthy for them to eat and don’t do anything to hurt them (looking at you guy that tried to kick him on Clemson snaps!)
Outsiders reading this article probably now think that the Clemson student body is nuts for being emotionally attached to a duck, that just happened to have chosen a pond on our campus instead of the middle of the woods or something, but it is pretty amazing how everyone rallies around it. There have been some tragic and stressful events at Clemson this year and it is little things like Dabo that keep us positive.