Wednesday 7 September 2011

The Sad Tale of The Three Little Ducks




Once upon a time......no wait, this isn't going to end well. I can't start with that or I have to finish with...and they all lived happily ever after, and they didn't.

When I last posted I was very excited about my cute little fluffy yellow ducklings. Well they grew bigger and followed me around like the mummy duck I was. Youngest dd returned from ballet boarding school with the comment "right, that's normal, ducks wandering around the kitchen" As the good mummy I am, I tried to encourage independence and took them for walks out to the copse where the hens live (much to my neighbours amusement).

And this is where it starts to go wrong. Leaving them with the hens on a sunny afternoon I walked back towards the house, stopping to chat with one of the neighbours who was returning from a walk with her dogs. Unfortunately the ducklings had squeezed out through the fencing and followed me out of the copse. Her German Shepherd puppy thought it would be fun to play with them. He really did no obvious harm but one of them died (in my arms...aaaahh) 5 minutes later, from shock I think.

So then they were two. I decided I had to wean them off me so when they were fully feathered they moved outside permanently in to their own duck house with run. Once the chickens were used to them and vice versa I took the run away to allow them a little more freedom. And here it starts to go wrong again.

If you are in the least bit squeamish stop reading now. One night we were late closing them up and for some reason the ducks had chosen to sleep in the bigger hen house. Thinking there was no problem with this my ds just closed the door on them. What he didn't realise was we had rats burrowed underneath this hen house.

The next morning the most gruesome sight met me. One dead duckling with slashed neck pulled half way down a rat hole. It was far too big to be pulled all the way down. I managed not to vomit and did the brave thing...ok ok I didn't. I made dh (he does have some uses and likes occasionally to feel that he has a useful role to play) go and deal with it.

So then there was one. Ducks are community minded creatures and don't like the solo life so I decided I had to get a new one and quick. I found (thanks to facebook friends) someone who bred them in Weardale so the very next day I dragged 2 of my teenagers and the 2 French teenagers we had staying on a 75 minute journey up hill and down dale (well it showed them rural England) to buy another duck - black Indian Runner this time. By the time we got back the lonesome duck had in fact made friends with the chickens and really didn't show any interest in the new addition. However after a couple of days they realised they were the same species, if different colours and now hang out together all the time.

Rats are now poisoned and gone and ducks happy and healthy. Moral of the story.,....animals are animals, not humans and I am NOT a mummy duck!!!




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