I am sitting here cuddling with two black ducklings chuckling at your stories. For me I can’t get chickens, as chicks they are great, but grown chickens faces worry me. But there is nothing cuter or sweeter than a sweet little ducky faces.
So the ducklings have now had 2 successful baths. Oh my good gosh golly oh mighty was that fun. Everybody instantly took to preening, and playing. All of them where very active and generally seems to enjoy it. It only lasted about 15 minutes till the started ti sit in the water, but it sure was a cute 15 minutes.
My lonely runner, she's secretly my favourite lady. I'd say duck, but Terry pretty much kicks the rumpus.
A'pollo has earned his stripes today! I had the Seramas out in the yard scratching while I was doing some work right next to them.
The older ducks came over to take a look. My oldest drake had not shown aggression yet, but tried to go for Nugget, the smallest chick. I quickly reached in and "pecked" his beak with my finger nail, just hard enough to get his attention. It worked, he backed up about 5 foot and just stared watching. Well A'pollo was not down with the that and 5 feet was not enough space, I guess. About 2 minutes after me pecking the drake, A'pollo goes flying right at the drake's face, pecked him mid flight, then turned landing about a foot in front of him. Then puffed himself up and started yelling at the ducks. It scared the living shit out of that drake. All 4 adults went running to the back yard. I laughed so hard I squeezed a tear out. There's a lot of heart in that tiny little chest!
I am so in love with these little chicks. Their personality is just amazing. If I walk away while they're out in the yard, and get about ten feet away I can hear their wings flapping, and just put my arms out and they perch on me from behind.
I've also been integrating the guineas in with them, and so far all is well. They are about the same size/age right now. They've pretty much just stayed in their own groups, but are eating and drinking together. Im taking that as a positive sign.
Yeah that featherless one is a cutie.
Proud dad aside and all, thank you. His first birthday is coming up next month. We're are doing a duck theme party. My part, provide ducky decor... Check!
I almost called the free chicken and duck ad. Although I think it's a prank, I'm open to being wrong lol.
Sometimes I have a hard time judging the intelligence level of my ducks. Most times, I think they're of a little bit less intelligence, but that's judging them against human standards. They just saw the chick starter bag in here yesterday for the first time. After the picture, I sat there to see what they were going to do, and they went straight to the chick feed. Now I know that they are creatures of habit, but that's not an established habit for them. So it does make me wonder at times, how smart are these birds without me even noticing.
Hehehe... Did y'all know Father's Day is this weekend? I had forgotten myself. Not working a 9-5, I tend to not follow the date very closely... So I'm having a chat with the misses, tell her I want to go to a local farm and look at Seramas on Sunday. This is how that chat went.
Hey hun I'd like to go to that farm Sunday. Is that what you want to do for fathers day? Oh, it's Father's Day huh? Sure, I guess so. It's your day, you can do whatever you'd like. Whatever? Well it's Father's Day, enjoy it. You know this is a farm Serama right. With 40+ breeding pairs. Right? Oh that's pretty cool. Hell yeah it is! I'm going to look for either a chocolate or black hen! Oh, a gold laced would be so cool! What?! I thought you where just going to look. Yeah, at a farm that has them for sale. We didn't discuss get more chickens. I'm pretty sure this qualifies as a discussion. A whole Serama is onlyI half a chicken anyways, c'mon.
Then I saw the same face I give my son listening to every toy description he's given me. All the sudden it made sense. I'm a man child at heart.
I'll emphasize the (grown) man part. I do bust my rump to provide, and teaching my son is the most important thing I do... but there's no need to lie about the child part ...
This is my son, who I must have reminded my wife of. He was so thrilled to have a chicken on his shoulder.
After a couple hours of us all hanging with the chicks in thr front yard, my wife (the grown up) decided she wanted 2-3 more Seramas also.
So in response to that, I'm strongly considering turning my 16'x24' out building in to the official "Quack Shack." It'd give me 328 sq/ft. Wheels are turning...