One time last summer, I'd been away, came home late and noticed that the food-bowl among the half-grown muscovy ducklings was empty. "Rats", I thought; "Poor ducks". And I decided to fill up their bowl for them to gorge in the next morning, when the light was up. For surely they wouldn't eat the same night, right? Sure, I'd read that ducks were different from chickens in that whereas chickens are pretty much blind in the darkness and won't budge a millimeter from their spot on the roost until sunset, ducks occasionally rise and walk around a little and possibly even eat at night. But this particular night, it was almost pitch-black outside. A tiny bit of moonlight - or perhaps light from some far-away lamp, I don't remember - illuminated things just enough for me to make out the white underbellies of the ducks, and the empty food bowl.
Anyway, I picked up the empty bowl and walked away to fill it. When I came back, a downright spooky scene awaited me: All 20-something ducklings had arisen from their sleeping spots and were standing still just inside the gate, looking up at me with their little eyes through the fence. Shaking off thoughts of films by Hitchcock or Spielberg, I walked in, and put the full bowl down.
They had obviously seen me walk away with the bowl, deduced that I would bring them more food (clever little buggers), and seen me come back. And now, they positively threw themselves on the food, and gorged, as vigorously as if it were broad daylight. No careful feeling around in the dark with the beak in order to not accidentally ram it into the wrong spot, just whamming it into the pellets.
I shot a little clip of it. Note that they're illuminated by my phone here:
Another duck keeper told me that he, anecdotally, had noticed that scovies seem to have better night-vision than ordinary ducks. Now, I know little of ordinary ducks, but our scovies certainly seem to have about as good night vision as humans, at least.
Anyway, I picked up the empty bowl and walked away to fill it. When I came back, a downright spooky scene awaited me: All 20-something ducklings had arisen from their sleeping spots and were standing still just inside the gate, looking up at me with their little eyes through the fence. Shaking off thoughts of films by Hitchcock or Spielberg, I walked in, and put the full bowl down.
They had obviously seen me walk away with the bowl, deduced that I would bring them more food (clever little buggers), and seen me come back. And now, they positively threw themselves on the food, and gorged, as vigorously as if it were broad daylight. No careful feeling around in the dark with the beak in order to not accidentally ram it into the wrong spot, just whamming it into the pellets.
I shot a little clip of it. Note that they're illuminated by my phone here:
Another duck keeper told me that he, anecdotally, had noticed that scovies seem to have better night-vision than ordinary ducks. Now, I know little of ordinary ducks, but our scovies certainly seem to have about as good night vision as humans, at least.
