Splashing around

Oh dear, the ducks have wanderlust! See this field? It's a little wet. The track marks are from the combine harvester that got a bit stuck last week while harvesting soybeans.

Can you see anything unusual?

Oh look, it's Charlie Sheen and three of the girl ducks. And in the far background is a flock of Canada geese!!!

These guys wandered down there and had a ball splashing around!

Charlie enjoyed rooting around in the mud (you can see soybeans that the combine missed on the upper right and left.)

The water was pretty deep in spots. The tile drainage in the this area isn't working particularly well!

Lots of snorkelling and flapping!

Ducks loooooove mud.

They also love water.

Bianca (white duck) had a good scratch. When I went out to check on everyone this afternoon, I looked down in the field and saw Bianca by herself in the midst of a HUGE flock of Canada geese!! I don't really want them mixing with wild birds; that's just an invitation to spread disease. But she seemed quite content and the geese were pretty much ignoring her.

I went down to round her up and all the geese freaked out and flew off in a panicked, honking mass. Bianca stood there calmly and watched them go. I herded up back towards the barn, where Oedipus and Karène came out to greet her. I can only imagine what they had to say to each other:

"Hussy! Hanging with the geese!"

"They're bigger than YOU, Oedipus!"

"Slut!"

"Eunuch!"

"Tart!"

"Castrato!"

"Floozy!"

"Cuckoo!"

Okay, maybe it was more along the lines of "Quack quack quack!" What can I say? I have a vivid imagination.

Heaven for ducks.

I can't say he was particularly clean after splashing around in the muck, but he was awfully happy.

Hannibal looked pleased with himself too.

See? Wanderlust!