Joining the Duck Side

[ihatedarkroast]

Just found out the ducks have been burying eggs deep in the straw and mud. A treasure trove! On top of that my molting chickens are starting to pick up laying again. I have 2 dozen eggs now. time to cook something yummy.

 

[Miss Lydia]

They make all things so moist when using duck eggs to bake with.

 

[ihatedarkroast]

A lady who couldn't take care of her ducks any more gave me 2 pekins and 2 mallard pekin crosses. Here are 3 of the 4.

Now these guys have caused a lot of drama. The mallard bros can fly. So the new ducks kept running away. I injured my foot chasing them over hill and dale. So the hubs clipped their wings. I kept them coop bound a couple days and that helped a lot. They stick around now.

Bigger problem is these people had 3 drakes and 1 duck. Very sweet family no clue about sex ratio in the flock. With my 3 ladies, that puts us at 4 ducks and 3 drakes, still unbalanced.

The pure pekin drake, Duke, keeps snipping at the hens if they walk by. He doesn't actually touch them, just displays territorially. And this only happens in the wee hours if the morning between dawn and when I open the coop door to let everyone out. But our red rooster decided to fight him. I broke it up 2xs. Unfortunately, the roo injured his leg trying to karate kick Duke the duck. He is a meat roo and quite a hefty boy.

Yesterday I noticed with a sinking heart that Duke's eye is messed up. I was afraid the eye was gone until I caught him and washed his head in the kitchen sink. Thank God it looks like only the outer eyelid and skin around the eye is torn. His 2nd eyelid appears fine. He also has a hole in his eyebrow, and the base of his beak is chewed up bloody. The eyeball itself looks clear. He seems able to see out of it. I used saline to wash it out, put in moisturizing drops. I put neosporin and purple wound goop on the outside wounds. It was very touching to see how much Duke enjoyed having his head washed and tended. What a sweetie!

Hubs took care of the red rooster after that, and its in our fridge resting for a few days.Im thinking brunswick stew. Live weight was almost 11 lbs! We should have eaten him back in December like we had originally planned. Anyway, hopefully there will be peace now.