Yolks! I mean Yikes! A store bought egg vs. one of ours.
Tuesday, October 25, 2011
Sunday, October 23, 2011
Sir Francis Drake
I figured it would be a good time for an honorary post, for an honorary duck, Sir Francis Drake.
Friday, September 30, 2011
Egg time!
I haven't tried any of the eggs, but there have been reports from up north that some of the chickens, and Sir Francis Drake, have started to lay eggs. Cluck you and Timbuktu have happily started laying them in a planter box near the tiny house (i.e. not in their designated laying box in the chicken coop). The eggs are blue.
Sir Francis must have laid the other egg, because he* is the only girl duck.
Perhaps in retrospect 5 ducks was a bit excessive. They really don't do very much, and they quack all night. One would think that ducks would settle down and sleep at night, but this is not the case. They will quack indignantly for a while, swim some (yes, even at 2 in the morning), and then continue their incessant quackery for the rest of the night (and day). Sir Francis is the leader of the little flock and he is by far the loudest. Apparently male ducks are quieter, while female ducks make the quintessential 'quack' noise. Unfortunately Sir Francis, with his egg laying ability is the only one of the ducks that has any utility so we can't just get rid of him. (Especially not after creating the 'what an honorary duck' song in his honor).
I haven't been spending a huge amount of time up North recently, but the few nights I've been up there I have a hard time sleeping because of all the racket these ducks make. I had a dream one night when I was up there where I made a nice duck coop on the complete opposite side of the field away from where we slept. Jay reports having what I would call a nightmare, where a critter got into the duck coop and killed the ducks, but left Sir Francis alive to quack another day.
Needless to say our few nights of annoyance are nothing compared to my poor father who has to sleep there every night. Given that he has access to a BB gun, I'm surprised we have not already had a duck dinner.
The chickens are great. Spencer goes out and clucks to them in the mornings before he leaves for school and gives them scraps. They've started to come running to him when he comes out. They sleep very quietly and are generally just fun to watch. The only potential pit fall with the chickens is that I've heard reports, starting about the time of the egg laying reports, that one of them is making cockerel sounds. This probably would be the last straw in terms of the allowable amount of poultry noise, so if a duck is to be spared we may need to have a free range chicken dinner instead.
*I have a hard time referring to Sir Francis as a she, but am aware of the inaccuracy of calling it a he.
The picture is of a store bought egg, 4 of our chicken eggs, and a duck egg.
Sir Francis must have laid the other egg, because he* is the only girl duck.
Perhaps in retrospect 5 ducks was a bit excessive. They really don't do very much, and they quack all night. One would think that ducks would settle down and sleep at night, but this is not the case. They will quack indignantly for a while, swim some (yes, even at 2 in the morning), and then continue their incessant quackery for the rest of the night (and day). Sir Francis is the leader of the little flock and he is by far the loudest. Apparently male ducks are quieter, while female ducks make the quintessential 'quack' noise. Unfortunately Sir Francis, with his egg laying ability is the only one of the ducks that has any utility so we can't just get rid of him. (Especially not after creating the 'what an honorary duck' song in his honor).
I haven't been spending a huge amount of time up North recently, but the few nights I've been up there I have a hard time sleeping because of all the racket these ducks make. I had a dream one night when I was up there where I made a nice duck coop on the complete opposite side of the field away from where we slept. Jay reports having what I would call a nightmare, where a critter got into the duck coop and killed the ducks, but left Sir Francis alive to quack another day.
Needless to say our few nights of annoyance are nothing compared to my poor father who has to sleep there every night. Given that he has access to a BB gun, I'm surprised we have not already had a duck dinner.
The chickens are great. Spencer goes out and clucks to them in the mornings before he leaves for school and gives them scraps. They've started to come running to him when he comes out. They sleep very quietly and are generally just fun to watch. The only potential pit fall with the chickens is that I've heard reports, starting about the time of the egg laying reports, that one of them is making cockerel sounds. This probably would be the last straw in terms of the allowable amount of poultry noise, so if a duck is to be spared we may need to have a free range chicken dinner instead.
*I have a hard time referring to Sir Francis as a she, but am aware of the inaccuracy of calling it a he.
The picture is of a store bought egg, 4 of our chicken eggs, and a duck egg.
Friday, May 20, 2011
A quack free week
Last weekend (05/14/11) we decided that we needed to ditch the ducks with my dad. They were only 3 weeks old, but they were already too big to spend all their time in a dog crate/IKEA drawer. Also, they were just flat out too messy/smelly for such a small space.
Because they are still young, my dad and siblings fashioned a multi-dog crate system to help ease them into being outside. Last night (05/19/11) was their first night outside, and when he checked on them at midnight Sir Francis Drake was swimming around.
The light in the first photo was intended to give them a source of heat at night, but unfortunately Maddy was in charge of buying a new light bulb after the old one burned out and she purchased a CFL. In her defense, it is almost impossible to buy a light bulb that isn't a CFL, and incandescent light bulbs were pretty much before her time.
Life for us has been much easier since they left! The chickens poop a lot, but are still far less demanding than the ducks.
Friday, May 6, 2011
Bernard Black
We've decided on a name for our black runner duck. Bernard Black in honor of the main character from Black Books.
Friends Not Food
We're trying hard to convince Thor that the new additions to our household are friends and not bite size (very fresh) treats. This seems like a difficult task because many of the main ingredients in his dog food are fowl. However, it seems as though we might be succeeding as evident by the photos.
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