If those colors are what you enjoy, then great. For me they appear overworked, unnatural and unpleasant. The digital manipulations have also resulted some strong halos expecially visible around the neck of the male bird. I would also consider removing some of those out of focus grasses on the left side of the image.
Thank you camperjimk and davidwien for your feedback.
The colours look good and the way I want on my desktop. Unfortunately there is no way to control how images appear in other people's browsers. Perhaps your screens and mine are calibrated and profiled differently. Or maybe your browser settings are different to mine.
However, on my phone the colours do appear a little stronger and more saturated than what I would like but as I said I can't control that.
Normally, I like bold colours but not too bold.
Regarding the halos, yes I have been a little lazy and not tidied those up yet, but for online displays I am happy to leave them there. If someone wants the image and doesn't like the halos they can remove them themselves.
I like the story and the idea of the image
As has already been mentioned I find the colours a bit strange. The bits and pieces (branches, twigs etc) are a bit distracting for me too
My eyes are pretty sh*t these days but most of the quackers seem oof
I think this is one to go back and make different attempts at, with different lighting, camera position and without the distractions. Just my 4 cents
The lighting in the image in my op is not the actual lighting when I took the photo.
Below is the "documentary" version and is pretty much what I saw at the time. It doesn't do a lot for me so I played around with colour grading until I came up with something I like.
I understand the branches and twigs can be distracting, depending on one's preferences and styles, but I like them as they provide a bit of natural framing overall and of the leading duck in particular.
It appears you have played around with the colors to your liking. If you are interested in critique and the opinion of others, then I can only suggest you might want to consider that for some of us, the jazzed up colors made a rather trite image even less appealing.
I liked the second photo more than the first one, especially the colors and detail on the birds appear better to me.
I would also prefer to have a bit more of the scene in front of the birds. Meaning there is more open space in the direction they are going, even if it's just water and waves.