On Saturday the husband and I said goodbye to our beautiful fawn and white runners, Charlotte and Daisy.
Their house and coop are completely predator-proof, but we had a larger area fenced with plastic snow fence for them to roam the yard in the daytime when we are home. One of the dogs got under then fence while we weren't watching. Thankfully we did not witness the event.
We are both completely torn up about it. I feel so guilty. We never left the dogs outside unsupervised, and I don't know what I was thinking when I did. I have never loved a pet as much as I loved the runners. Something about their sweet, innocent, defenseless nature made them so very special. They were our first two ducks of five, but we both don't quite feel the same love for the other three ducks or even for our dogs as we did for those runners.
I first considered ducks as pets when I saw some Pekin ducklings at a local Rural King. I did lots of research on setting up a brooder, building them the safest coop, feeding them the best food and treats, and ensuring they were the happiest ducks could be. Once we were prepared, we went back to Rural King to pick up our ducklings, except this time we found some unlabeled, strangely tall ducklings instead. We asked the store associate whether they were Pekins, and he said he assumed so. We decided to take two. I spent every day for the next six months with the ducks while I was off work and had the pleasure of watching them grow from silly, nervous, little ducklings into the most beautiful fawn and white runners. I remember when their fawn color first started showing on their feathers I had thought they were just dirty and kept trying to clean them off, of course to no avail.
I learned so much from this forum that helped me provide my runners with the best three years they could have lived, and in turn those runners brought us more joy than we could have ever imagined. This forum is probably the only place that I might find anyone else that could understand just how special the love for a duck can be.
Rest in peace my sweet Charlotte and Daisy, my beautiful birds. You will be forever loved and missed.
Their house and coop are completely predator-proof, but we had a larger area fenced with plastic snow fence for them to roam the yard in the daytime when we are home. One of the dogs got under then fence while we weren't watching. Thankfully we did not witness the event.
We are both completely torn up about it. I feel so guilty. We never left the dogs outside unsupervised, and I don't know what I was thinking when I did. I have never loved a pet as much as I loved the runners. Something about their sweet, innocent, defenseless nature made them so very special. They were our first two ducks of five, but we both don't quite feel the same love for the other three ducks or even for our dogs as we did for those runners.
I first considered ducks as pets when I saw some Pekin ducklings at a local Rural King. I did lots of research on setting up a brooder, building them the safest coop, feeding them the best food and treats, and ensuring they were the happiest ducks could be. Once we were prepared, we went back to Rural King to pick up our ducklings, except this time we found some unlabeled, strangely tall ducklings instead. We asked the store associate whether they were Pekins, and he said he assumed so. We decided to take two. I spent every day for the next six months with the ducks while I was off work and had the pleasure of watching them grow from silly, nervous, little ducklings into the most beautiful fawn and white runners. I remember when their fawn color first started showing on their feathers I had thought they were just dirty and kept trying to clean them off, of course to no avail.
I learned so much from this forum that helped me provide my runners with the best three years they could have lived, and in turn those runners brought us more joy than we could have ever imagined. This forum is probably the only place that I might find anyone else that could understand just how special the love for a duck can be.
Rest in peace my sweet Charlotte and Daisy, my beautiful birds. You will be forever loved and missed.
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