How I spend my Saturday nights!

Yep, bathing and blow-drying a duck! 

(Blow-drying because it's below freezing at night and I don't want to put wet ducks out in the cold.) I think the Ontario SPCA sweatshirt is very appropriate attire.

The ducklings (I hesitate to call them ducklings now as they are almost full-grown) are still frustrating me with their pinfeather-cannibalism. I seem to be bathing a few ducklings every weekend. I get them cleaned up and reasonably healed, reintegrate them, enjoy a few days of blissful bloodlessness, then go down to find two or three bleeders yet again! And the process is repeated. I seem to have three ducks who are being repeatedly snacked-upon, so now I have them in a separate run, which is working out better. When they've healed up properly, I will take another stab a reintegration.

It's not really deliberate nastiness going on. Apparently pinfeathers are a protein-filled snack, and some of the ducklings have been indulging themselves at their siblings' expense. They just grab the ends of their wings and nibble or bite, which results in a lot of bleeding, not to mention an unattractive look.

I'm heading down today to treat their wounds with Blu Kote yet again. I have read that boredom can result in feather-picking, but the ducks have a huge run, treats, good food, things to explore, plus I let them out to free range as well! So unless I can teach them to play Scrabble with me, I think their little ducky brains are sufficiently stimulated. I suspect they are really just vampire ducklings.

Surprisingly, they all seem to like it.

And please excuse our bathroom walls. I have stripped the wallpaper (you don't want to know when I started that project, but let's just say it was snowing at the time, and we haven't had a snowfall this season.) We are waiting for the plaster guy to show up and repair our old walls so we can finally paint. Eventually I want to do a whole bathroom reno but that'll have to wait until Gordon is a rich lawyer, ha ha.  Or until I sell a million copies of the book I am going to write about blow-drying ducks!

Here's a video Gordon took with his iPhone. I thought he was taking photos which is why I was smiling at the camera. Then I indulge in my typical "I'm talking to an animal so it is imperative I sound like an idiot" babble. As you can see, Naomi wanted to help. The ducks are too big for the cats to mess with!

Yep, Saturday night at the farm. I have no life!

Duck-o-rama

I know you all need a duck fix!

On Wednesday, the beautiful warm sunny day, I went down to change all the duck water and found this...

"Amy" (growing more suspicious that Amy is really a man!) and unnamed duckling sharing a bath and grooming session. Note the water! Ducks make a filthy mess of their water every day. They drink a lot while eating and get food and all manner of muck in their buckets and bowls. I give everything a good scrub every day, but as soon as everything is clean, the ducks leap in and make it all dirty again!

They were really enjoying the warm sunny weather. I think just about everybody ended up having a bath.

That's mama-duck Eugenia in the upper left-most bowl.

Warren, Charlie Sheen, Ronna and MacGregor took advantage of the open gate and went for a stroll, accompanied by one of the English muff hens (top left!) The muffs, as we like to call them, are excellent aviators and regularly take off from their run, which is not fully covered across the top. At night, they always return to the coop. They are wild and crazy and I don't bother trying to stop them. While they are more vulnerable to predators this way, they are way smarter and faster than the other chickens so I worry less about them getting caught. And most of the time, the muffs just hang out in the duck run! I think they like the ducks better than their own coop-mates. The ducks really are more mellow and less mean than chickens.

Charlie Sheen leading his entourage.

The ever-handsome Warren!

I love this photo. What do you think Charlie is saying?

MacGregor used to be boss until Warren came along.

The dogs are so good with the ducks and chickens!

Charlie's feathers are looking so beautiful. They are black and iridescent green and look gorgeous in the sunlight.

"Amy" and a girl-duck. I like Amy. She or he is very sweet-natured.

We've decided to build the ducks a "coop" in the barn, next to the chicken coop, so that they have a big indoor space in winter when needed. The two duckhouses we have are adequate but I want them to have more room if they have to spend time inside in really bad weather.

Yeah, the ducks definitely aren't paying for themselves, unlike those egg-laying hens! The roosters of course are deadwood. :)

In the news again

This is pretty funny. I have been in newspapers twice in a week for my graphic design work. In 21 years of being a designer, I have never gotten so much recognition as I have here! Usually I am paid in silence, and that's the end of it. No fame! :)

This summer, we three local girls (all come-from-aways to Glengarry) worked on a calendar for the Ottawa chapter of the Osteoporosis Society of Canada. Bonnie co-ordinated everything and did the writing for the calendar. My friend Ronna did wonderful bone illustrations; only Ronna could make a bone whimsical! Check out more pictures from the calendar on Ronna's blog. 

This page always cracks me up:

That naughty, naughty smoking/drinking femur!

Spring in November

The weather is nuts here. We almost set a record today with the temperature pushing 17C/63F. Utterly bizarre!  But the animals love it...

I took the dogs for a walk and Sophie had a satisfying roll in the grass afterwards.

This is abnormal. Bees should be inside clustering at this time of year, not hatching new babies and flying around outside the hive like crazy people.  I just wrapped the hives on the weekend.

Also utterly bizarre: dandelions blooming in mid-November. This is wrong, wrong, wrong...

In the woodlot, a new little maple tree at the edge of the white pine and white spruce plantation.

Still some leaves hanging on here and there.

The soybeans are still on the fields too. Usually they are harvested by October. It has been a really weird year.

Tristan is happy!

Roll, roll, roll... 

A Story in Each of Us: Memories of Glengarry Storytellers

The Ottawa Citizen had a very nice write-up this past weekend on the book I spent this summer designing and typesetting, and there is a very kind mention of ME in the article:

http://www.ottawacitizen.com/news/story+each/5661718/story.html

There's a little video, too:

http://www.ottawacitizen.com/life/Video+Story+Each/5610889/story.html?cid=megadrop_story

Definitely my most appreciative clients ever! They also gave me a "gift certificate" for some exotic hens from a local breeder (where got our seven current "exotic" chickens.)

To order A Story in Each of Us: Memories of Glengarry Storytellers, visit www.glengarryencore.com or send your request with your name, address and phone number to: WIN Publishing, Glengarry Encore Education, 7 Main St., P.O. Box 1315, Alexandria, Ont., K0C 1A0.

The ducks demand equal time

The ducks are annoyed that the chickens got airtime yesterday and are demanding I make up for it. That's okay, it's time to introduce...

...Warren the Upper Canada Village duck! 

Warren is spending the winter with us. He is great-granddaddy to our own ducklings.

Warren is very handsome, friendly and curious. He is also the BOSS.

Something happened to Warren's wing a while back (he is seven years old) and it didn't heal properly, so it sticks out at a wonky angle. But it doesn't seem to bother him.

Handsome devil!

 As you can see, the ducks have been busy drilling holes in the ground.

They've also been enjoying the sunny, unseasonably-warm weather we've been having lately. That's Hannibal on the left (the biggest "duckling"... hard to call him that when he's bigger than his Mama now!)  Amy is just to the right, however...

I am starting to supsect "Amy" is a boy. I need to learn how to sex a duck. I am just going by the fact that Amy is almost as big as Hannibal. They seem to like each other and I often find them hanging out together. A name change may be in order. I don't like "Amos", so I will have to come up with another self-destructive superstar... Kurt Cobain? Jim Morrison? Heath Ledger? Someone like that. But I'll make sure she's a he first.

Aren't they attractive?

One of the girls (I have a hard time right now telling the white ones apart) likes to sit on my lap and get the back of her neck scratched.

There, hopefully that will satisfy the ducks' demands for today!

Chickens and garlic

Okay all you chefs and cooks and men, this is not about some delicious chicken recipe. It's about me planting my garlic yesterday, and the chickens giving me "assistance."

 

I swear these hens would eat anything!

"Is this a garlic I see before me? The pointy bit toward my beak? Come, let me munch thee!"

Penelope was hell on wheels yesterday. After I broke the garlic bulb into cloves for planting, she kept trying to steal them!

Get your head out of there, wench!!

I get my garlic from Richters Herbs every year. This time I bought Uzbekistan garlic, plus a another purple variety the name of which I have already forgotten.

Gordon thoughtfully tilled the new garlic patch for me, but really I could have just let the hens do it. they do love helping in the garden!

And here is my favourite hen, Charlotte (ssssssh, don't tell the others!) Doesn't she look great after coming through her moult? She was unwell earlier this summer, with a floppy comb and raspy breathing,  but she's doing much better now. She still sounds a bit asthmatic but is otherwise fine and laying nice eggs. I worry when the roosters chase her, though. She breathes so heavily afterwards that  I worry she will one day have a heart attack and drop dead during coitus! But for now she seems happy. The other day she ran up to me while I was sitting in the duck run and climbed up onto my lap.

 Meanwhile, back in the garlic patch, Errol Flynn (right) helps the ladies search for bugs.

Errol is a really nice rooster with a laid-back temperament. Actually, all three of our roosters are nice. We were careful to bring them up right. They respect humans!

 Although Errol is the biggest rooster, he is second in the chain of command after Lord Gaga. Beaker ranks #3.

Nice work, girls!

Anastasia, front left, is our sole surviving red Sex-Link hen from 2009. The black Sex-Links have been longer-lived.

I think that's Cupcake.

Anastasia has a bit of baldy-butt from the roosters' over-energetic affections, but it's growing back in.

I am tempted to end with a duck photo, but I promised the chickens that this would be their day in the sun!

Now that the garlic is planted, winter can come. More than once I have been out planting it amidst snow flurries, but the weather was quite lovely yesterday.

Puppy love

Last weekend our friend Marie-Emmanuelle (mother to our future godson) came to visit, bringing along her 4-1/2 month old German Shepherd puppy, Jack. The newlywed Marie-Emmanuelle has been without her hubby Patrick for an entire month, as he was away in the US, doing training for his new job. They were happily reunited last Friday! But last Sunday, she came for a solo visit.

I am liking your new short haircut, Miss Marie!

 

Check out this cutie!

 

I seemed to end up with a lot of photos of Jack running at the camera!

The farm in all its mid-autumn glory. No snow yet!

Mr. Handsome!

I'm surprised he can't fly with those ears.

Jack is an excellent puppy with a wonderful temperament, and he is already very well-trained.

I love German Shepherds. I think I got that from my mother, who grew up with them and was always raving about them.

Jack decided to jump in the pond but judging by how fast he got out (and the look of surprise on his face), he wasn't ready for how deep it was!

Damp doggy.

He cautiously explored the Beaudette River at the back of our property.

It was beautiful in the late-afternoon light.

Spot the camouflaged pooch!

What a good boy!

We had fun playing with milkweed pods in the wind.

Jack loved the fluff!

 

Until he'd had enough of it all stuck to his face!

He's growing up to be a beautiful dog. What a great day!