I can't believe we're most of the way through October already. I've been staying home, pretty much, since March and you'd think the time would drag, but nope. I feel like I'm in some kind of weird Twilight Zone episode where the days race by and then it's night again and repeat.
Last night I went to let Smokey and Zoya in the backyard and there were two female ducks (I think they're Mallards) in there! They were chowing down on all the greens left from the garden. Sure made me think of my silly ducks and how much I miss them, but, wow, they were a lot of work. I would take them peas and brown rice in the mornings when they were little and it became a ritual. I was afraid to go in there without their treats! I've never heard of ducks attacking people, but with my luck, I would have been the first. After I would let them out, I would muck out their barn, gather up the eggs and put down fresh straw. It's too bad it was so expensive to take care of them properly, straw was more than $20 a bale and I would go through 2 bales every week. Plus, I never thought about killing them when they were too old to lay eggs... I was horrified when someone suggested I do that every few years. THEY WERE MY BABIES! So, I did learn that I'm not very good with farming animals.
We put a little fiberglass skiff in their yard for their pool. What a nightmare that was to clean. I could drain it a little, but mostly I had to bail it out with a 5 gallon bucket. I'd notice the ducks weren't going in there and yelling at me about a problem in the pool, inevitably one of the girls would have "egged" in the pool and they wouldn't go back in until it was drained and cleaned. I'm looking for the video of the duck go-round that greeted me every morning and as soon as I find it I will post it.
I never did get them to be very friendly towards me except for one time when I noticed a goshawk hovering above their pen trying to get in through the net. I went running out with a broom and shooed the hawk off and they all ran to me. I was their hero for about a minute until they forgot again. When they were really small, a little doe used to come around and check them out. I always thought it was so sweet and maternal until I found out that deer will sometimes eat baby birds... Never knew that. Deer are apparently way more sinister than I ever imagined.
Here is a great, but loud, video of a part of our morning routine.
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