Wednesday, December 3, 2008

Duckling Update

Well, there are nine ducklings out of a possible ten. Harpo is officially a rockstar.

By 3:00 yesterday, Christian decided to get her and the kiddos moved to the coop. When he went to get them, three eggs had still not hatched, though the ducks had pipped them. He broke them open and managed to save two of the ducklings by warming them up in the house for a couple hours. The third was DOA.

By five o'clock he had put the two gimpy ducks with the others under mama and we hoped for the best. The whole clan spent the night in a dogloo, in the chicken coop, with a little heater on them, just because we're softies.

This morning those two were indistinguishable from the rest. Victory!

Here is the brood. Sick cute. We hope they'll all make it. We'll leave them in the coop for a few days until they seem steady and ready to go and then they'll be left to free range in the wilds of BHF. If you need a duckling,let us know. We're trying to get the Arroyos to take one. Not sure how many we'll need to sell on Craigslist yet. ...four dollah. (But one free to the Arroyos family)




4 comments:

SweetMissDaisy (Anna Wight) said...

How stinkin' CUTE are they!! Congrats! And wow! 9 of 10 is GREAT!!

Mommy, M.D. said...

wow, those are cute.

we tried ducklings two years ago, but they got eaten their first night out of the coop. it was so sad. maybe we could try again; i always thought they would have done better if they'd had a mama to teach them the ways of the world first.

they are a royal pain to raise inside the house, though. they kept splashing around in the water bowl and sloshing the water out. big mess.

Blue Heron Farm said...

We considered bringing them in the house, but were STRONGLY advised no to because of the mess. :)

We raised Harpo and her two brothers in the house for a week or so and then had them live in the coop until feathered out a bit. Trudy is good at protecting birds, so we haven't lost any yet.

We'll have extras if you want to try again; :)

Harpo taught them all to drink and eat today. So unbelievably adorable.

Katarina said...

Yeah, at least the Carlson's know better than to accept birds from BHF no matter how cute they may be!

Just kidding, Tony is doing great...y'all must have scared the bejeebers out of him to make him straighten up.

want him back now?

Anyway baby ducks tend to be rather malodorous inside the house so I'd let Harpo keep on doing what she is doing so well already.