Every day, police officers respond to reports of all sorts of events and nonevents, most of which never make the news. Here is a sampling of lesser-known — but no less noteworthy — incidents from police log books (a.k.a. blotters) in our suburbs.

MAKE WAY FOR DUCKLINGS, 2016

At 6:32 p.m. May 7, police and firefighters were dispatched to Legacy Place in Dedham to rescue a family of ducklings that had fallen into a storm drain. The 10 ducklings were successfully reunited with their mother. Three days later, it was deja vu all over again: Ducklings were reported stuck in a storm drain on Route 1. Once again, the Dedham police and fire departments responded and helped the baby birds to safety. It’s actually not all that uncommon: If a mother duck walks across a storm drain, her babies will follow, and if they’re too small, they can fall through the sewer grates. A similar situation had unfolded April 24, when some ducklings got trapped in a storm drain in Lexington. Police, firefighters, and the Animal Rescue League of Boston worked together to pull eight ducklings out of the storm drain. The birds were placed in a box, and released at a nearby creek, as the mother followed along.

JUST DUCKY

At 8:44 a.m. May 5, a Chase Circle man called Peabody police to report seeing two mallard ducks in his swimming pool. (He did, it seems, have the good grace not to use the 911 emergency line to issue his alert.) He was advised to shoo them away or let them leave on their own.

COUNTING SHEEP

Ducks checking out a pool seems much like Mother Nature intended. But when it comes to animals popping up in the oddest places, there’s this: On the evening of May 7, Northborough police were told a lone sheep was wandering along a section of the Wachusett Aqueduct, which carries water from a reservoir to a Massachusetts Water Resources Authority treatment plant. By the time police arrived, the creature had taken off.

KILLER BEES? NAH

At 12:08 p.m. May 9, Norwood police received a call from a resident of Sumner Street who reported that a beehive was “compromised’’ and a swarm of honeybees was loose in the area. The animal control officer responded and determined there was nothing wrong. Despite the neighbor’s concern about the bees’ movements, the officer found quite normal behavior and no cause for alarm.

A DIFFERENT KIND OF BANG

Just after 6:30 p.m. April 20, a caller told Stow police that people on Warren Road were lighting fireworks, despite lots of young children in the area. The responding officer discovered that the real source of the noise was not fireworks, but something else entirely: Someone was working on a car, and the vehicle kept backfiring.

I THOUGHT I WAS FORGETTING SOMETHING . . .

At 2:36 p.m. May 5, a woman called Bridgewater police to report seeing a car being driven along Main Street with a gas pump handle sticking out of the vehicle. Apparently, the driver forgot to remove the nozzle from the gas tank before taking off. According to police, the absent-minded motorist returned to the gas station and spoke to employees after realizing the error; miraculously, the gas pump was not damaged. The gas station chose not to pursue the matter further.

I STOLE THE NEWS TODAY, OH BOY . . .

At 10:22 a.m. May 10, a staffer from the Salem News came into the Peabody police station to report that the metal newspaper stand had been stolen from the Dunkin’ Donuts on Washington Street. An officer was sent to document the disappearance.

MYSTERY SOLVED

On May 11, Salem police responded to the Lobster Shanty on Front Street to investigate a bone that was dug up during construction of a patio. Detectives photographed it and sent a picture along to the medical examiner’s office. A forensic anthropologist determined that it was nothing nefarious: It proved to be a metacarpal bone — not of a human, but of a cow.

Emily Sweeney can be reached at esweeney@globe.com. Follow her on Twitter @emilysweeney.