My Love Affair With Ducks...

[Mimi13]

I still have the scars on my lower legs from 2008! - If humanity ever settles on other worlds in space, there is (at least) one species we should leave behind under all circumstances…
No ants visible in this video, but still scary:

This video was excellent and for those who do t have to deal with fire ants, be thankful. If there’s one thing I could get rid of it would be the fire ant.

They are so bad where I live I am forced to hang anything that has food in it (chicken, dog, cat, horse). I bought one of the Grandpa’s Feeders for my chickens. Well, that lasted about 20 minutes before the ants invaded it. It is now back in its box. I have no use for it.

The ants are so bad I have to keep poultry dust sprinkled on the ground underneath the chicken feeders so they are not bothered by ants as they try to eat.

If I have to buy sweet feed for my horses for any reason during the summer, I place the bag in the middle of a wheelbarrow and sprinkle the poultry dust around the outside of the bag. That way the ants never make it to the open end of the bag. This stuff kills the ants instantly.

I can only hope that my new ducklings love to eat fire ants. But I kind of doubt I could be so lucky.

 

[Mimi13]

You have bees!?! - I wanted to start with bees this spring, but missed the local beekeeper-classes. Now everything is cancelled due to that stupid beer and i likely have to wait until next year. I love bees and honey! One of my uncles was a beekeeper and he taught me lot's of things about honey and bees, but that's over 40 years ago… The darker the honey the healthier he said.

Local honey also is very good for someone suffering from allergies.

 

[Mimi13]

It works excellent on things with an exoskeleton: »Diatomite is of value as an insecticide, because of its abrasive and physico-sorptive properties. The fine powder absorbs lipids from the waxy outer layer of the exoskeletons of many species of insects; this layer acts as a barrier that resists the loss of water vapour from the insect's body. Damaging the layer increases the evaporation of water from their bodies, so that they dehydrate, often fatally.«
See here under "Pest Control". - but as said, seeing these little b@stards burn in gasoline is much more satisfying, especially if they had just stung the life out of your legs…

The Ortho brand Orthene does not kill the ants instantly. It allows them time to take the poison back to the queen before it kills. It does its job, but I prefer to watch them die. Yeah, I can be brutal.

I forgot to mention in an earlier post that when I was a kid I had several ant farms. They were so interesting, but they weren’t fire ants back then.

 

[Mimi13]

Look at that pile of ducklings! I always love watching them huddling together to sleep. They do that even when it is warm, they just need that close contact. And look at Petey's little winglet!

Lord help, that Petey is huge and is a hog! I will post more pics/vids later.

 

[Mimi13]

My first year with bees... I ain’t takin no stinkin classes.



I gotz YouTube and “beekeeping for dummies”
What more count I need?


here is my adventure with bees..

https://www.backyardchickens.com/threads/the-honey-factory.1358454/

First and foremost, a dang bee suit! Did that Dummy book not tell you that one?

 

[Mimi13]

What stupid beer? Is it a micro brew. Spell check does the strangest things.

Silly HillBilly is talking about the Corona virus.

 

[Mimi13]

I am still going to wear my latex gloves...

let the dog have the potato chip

and not raise a sloppy dux...

I know the dishwasher thing is weird, but we all have quirks..


if you really wanted to see something ugly. You should have been at the wedding when I picked up my beer to take a swig only to discover I picked up another guys bottle that he was dumping butts into..

I almost died when the filter hit my mouth..

I can’t believe I didn’t end up in the ER that day.

I’m laughing at you, but not too hard, only because I’ve done the same dang thing! I was spitting ashes and beer for 20 minutes.

 

[Angileen]

Did the same thing as a kid with my uncle's chicken "garage" - concrete floor no problems. And i would do the same thing with my duck house today - during summer - but i'm scared of splinters… a poop soaked splinter in your foot can cost you a limb. And i kind of like my feet and legs and hands. I'm also wearing a mask against the dust and leather gloves to protect my hands.

Tried a mask in the chicken coop when cleaning, took it off feels like you can't breath when doing heavy labor.

 

[Mimi13]

I leave food out 24/7 for mine but am in the minority here. I find they eat less if it's always there as they snack around instead of falling on it like a ravaging horde. We save that for peas.

Oh yes, these boogers have their food 24/7 and still act starved. I think it’s because I have dropped a few peas in the bathtub when they were swimming to watch them dive after them. Now they think that should be on their menu all the time.

 

[Angileen]

Hell i did combine hay, straw and pine shavings! The result with, at that time, 19 ducks was a ½ foot thick hardboard that was almost impossible to remove from the duck house with my pitch-fork.

I tried a pitch fork to clean the coop works like crap, I use a garden rake and grain shovel and a broom to get the fine stuff.