More ducklings day 20

Some duckling closeups today.

I plan to reassemble the duckling run and let them out into it in the next day or two. It’s going to be hot later in the week, so that’ll be good timing.

Everyone arrayed watching me:

Ducklings

Look at my cute little wings!

Look at my wings!

Waiting for their treats:

Ducklings

Ducklings

The Blue Swedish sitting in the corner:

Ducklings

Rouen closeup:

Duckling closeup

When visiting after lunch to open the vent, I found a Rouen in her favorite spot:

Ducklings

Peeking from the cupboard into the nesting box:

Ducklings

Aerial photos in August

I flew my drone over the homestead yesterday. Interesting to compare to when I did so in June and back in April and March.

Let’s begin with an angled aerial shot of the apple trees in the field, the flowerbeds, pond, back lawn, and veggie garden:

Aerial of flowerbeds, pond, etc

The reverse angle, with the shop, hoop house, veggie garden, back lawn, pond, and flowerbeds:

Veggie garden, back lawn, pond

Closer to the pond, with the ducks visible; they weren’t sure what to make of the strange noisy bird hovering and flying nearby:

Pond

Another angle of the pond and ducks:

Pond

And another:

Pond

GIF of flying upwards from the pond:

GIF of pond zoom

One more from lower down; I think this is the first time I’ve hovered over the pond:

Pond and ducks

The flowerbeds and white gazebo:

Flowerbeds

Beehives, greenhouse, veggie garden, chicken coops, hoop house, back of shop:

Beehives, veggie garden, hoop house

Veggie garden:

Veggie garden

Hops taking over the top of the berry cage:

Hops

The berry cage and weather wind speed and direction sensors:

Berry cage and weather sensors

Mount Hood is looking a lot less snowy at this time of year:

Mount Hood

Zoomed in on Mount Hood:

Mount Hood

More ducklings day 19

Sunday duckling day… who am I kidding, every day is duckling day.

Or night; here are sleeping ducklings:

Sleeping ducklings

Two Rouens on the EcoGlow; they really like that spot. I was amused by one having a leg stretched out behind her:

Stretched out leg on EcoGlow

Ducklings waiting for treats:

Ducklings waiting for treats

Ducklings waiting for treats

Ducklings waiting for treats

Yay treat time:

Ducklings with treats

Ducklings with treats

It’s nice to see their waterproofing efforts paying off, with water droplets on their backs (though the duckling fluff isn’t as waterproof as their eventual feathers):

Water droplets on ducklings

Cat update for week ending August 29

Welcome to Caturday! Cuteness! Paladin! Raccoons! Levitating cat! A random GIF! And more!

Dinner queue:

Dinner queue

Porcini:

Porcini

Pommie in her favorite place:

Pommie

Pommie and Bella at the cat feeder:

Pommie and Bella

Paladin watches Bella on the driveway:

Paladin watches Bella on the driveway

Bella is curious, and approached:

Bella is curious

Paladin and Bella curiously watching each other:

Paladin watches Bella

A closer look at Bella:

Bella

Pommie was comfy in her cabin, then raccoons approached; she hissed at them:

Pommie hissing at raccoons

The raccoons circled around behind, and Pommie wisely retreated; you can see raccoon eyes between the cabins:

Pommie retreating from raccoons

There was a mother and at least one kit:

Raccoons

Pommie was happy to go back later, though:

Pommie

On a hot day, Pepper on her non-heated bed on top of shelves in the shop (there’s a heating pad on the nearby blue bed for cold days):

Pepper in the shop

Spud thought he heard something in the breezeway:

Spud

Spud in his cabin:

Spud

Bella walking through the breezeway while Spud is sleeping in late:

Bella and Spud

Levitating cat! A frame of mid-run through the breezeway:

Running cat

Breakfasttime:

Breakfasttime

Dinnertime:

Dinnertime

Sparkletime — a GIF of the dappled sun through the trees by the cat house, which makes it very hard to spot cat activity when reviewing recordings around midday, as the camera is pretty much constantly registering motion (it does look nice, though):

Sparkletime

More ducklings day 17

We had Flock Friday this morning; now it’s time to check on the newest additions, the ducklings.

It’s hard to find a non-blurry picture from the morning, so let’s lean into the motion with a GIF:

GIF of ducklings

Here are a couple decent shots:

Ducklings with treats

Ducklings

Spotted on the cam around lunchtime:

Ducklings

Less movement after lunch, when I went out to open the vent:

Ducklings

Ducklings

Ducklings

Ducklings

Flock Friday for August 28

Welcome to another Flock Friday!

Let’s begin with an animated GIF of ducks and fish at night:

GIF of ducks and fish at night

Ducks on the pond bank from different angles:

Ducks on the bank

Ducks on the bank

Ducks on the bank

Some ducks headed up the ramp to the duck house, even though the pop door is closed:

Ducks on the ramp

You can just make them out from the other cam too:

Ducks on the ramp

Ducks on the pond:

Ducks on the pond

Night ducks:

Night ducks

Chickens waiting for treats:

Chickens waiting for treats

Chickens with treats:

Chickens with treats

Chickens with treats

Chickens with treats

Chickens with treats

Chickens with treats

Chickens with treats

Chickens with treats

Chickens with treats

Finally, the ducks on the opposite side of the duck house from normal:

Ducks

More ducklings day 14

The ducklings are two weeks old today. They’ve grown a lot already, but still have several more weeks of growth ahead of them before they can join the ducks in the pond.

As mentioned yesterday, I introduced them to the paint tray pool a couple of days early, and left it in the duck house full-time, a change from previous ducklings, but I think safe enough.

They took advantage of that with some night wading:

Night wading

In the morning, I refreshed the water, then offered to hand-feed some lettuce. They were hesitant at first:

Treat?

But soon approached, and took turns grabbing it out of my hand:

Treat?

I then tossed in some more, and they enjoyed eating them from the tray:

Treats

Treats in the pool

Everyone in the pool (did you see the video?). They won’t be able to do this for long, as they continue to grow, but in two or three weeks time I’ll introduce them to the more spacious kiddie pool:

Everyone in the pool

An animated GIF of cute little flapping wings:

GIF of flapping wings

Flapping tiny wings:

Flapping wings

Flapping wings

Eating from the EcoGlow:

Eating

Fresh water for afternoon pool time:

In the pool