US woman and young granddaughter drown while feeding ducks

A US woman and her young granddaughter have drowned in a Florida lake while feeding ducks.

Authorities pulled the bodies of 59 year old Laura Zulema Fleming and her four year old granddaughter Leila Fleming from the small lake at the Silver Shores gated community in Miramar on Monday morning, the Sun Sentinel reports.

The pair had gone to feed the ducks at around 7pm the evening before, but when they did not return the alarm was raised.

"Unfortunately it appears they had been deceased for a period of time," Miramar police spokeswoman Tania Rues told the Sentinel.

"Based on accounts from family members, neither the grandmother nor the four-year-old knew how to swim."

Autopsies showed both had drowned, while Ms Rues said they were no signs of foul play.

"The information that we gathered from the family is that she was a very doting grandmother, was always with the grandchild and they would go out on occasion," Ms Rues said, adding that family members have been left distraught by the tragedy.