More ducklings day 31

See today’s Flock Friday post for info on our evacuation state, and the rest of the flock. For the six rapidly-growing ducklings we have with us, they’ve settled into their new reality, and are enjoying their more spacious digs in the trailer pen. When we can go home again, it’ll be a downgrade for them!

Breakfast for ducklings:

Ducklings

Breakfast

Pool time:

Pool time

Leafy treats:

Leafy treats

Leafy treats

Leafy treats

More pool time:

Pool time

Pool time

Pool time

Dinner time:

Dinner time

Flock Friday for September 11 (plus evacuation update)

As you may have seen, we had to evacuate our homestead due to some nearby wildfires. We are safe at Mom’s place, three hours north, along with our dog Rory and pet cats Pippin and Paladin, and the six ducklings.

The rest of the animals are still back at the homestead. The older ducks have their pond, so plenty of water of course, and can root around for bugs, though they may get a bit hungry. I’m more worried about the chickens.

I’m kicking myself that in our rush to evacuate, I didn’t take a few minutes to top up their food dispensers, or at least toss a bag of food in the coop. So they will likely run out of food from the dispensers sometime around now or the next day or two. They also have a couple of partial flock blocks (compressed blocks of supplemental food), which should keep them going another day or two. After that, hopefully they’ll subsist on the eggs they’re laying. If we’re away too long, they’ll probably start eating each other — chickens are vicious little dinosaurs.

They should have enough water for a while. The power is still off; if it comes on, the outdoor waterers would refill, but the water supply requires power, as it’s a well. I suspect the power will remain off until after the evacuation order is lifted.

Depending on how long that takes, we may go home to dead chickens, which would be unfortunate. But not as unfortunate as if the fire reaches our homestead. So far, it’s a couple of miles away, so hopefully won’t get closer. Here’s a map of the fires in the county. And a state-wide one; the “Riverside” fire is the main threat for our homestead. (I don’t publicly post exactly where our homestead is for privacy reasons.)

As of now, that fire has burned over 130,000 acres (of mostly trees), destroyed 33 houses and 20 other structures, and is 0% contained. Not great. But at least there haven’t been any fatalities from it so far.

So, that’s where things are at currently. The main thing is that we’re safe; much appreciation to Mom and her partner for providing a refuge for us, our pets, and the ducklings. Read the duckling posts for more on them.

Let’s enjoy some pictures from before all this went down. Here are the chickens:

Chickens

I feel like they’re looking at me in an accusing way, as if they could foretell the future… but that’s just how they normally look:

Chickens

Two ducks on an upturned pot island:

Two ducks on island

Ducks in the shallow end of the pond:

Ducks

Sleeping in the shade under a shrub:

Ducks under shrub

Ducks and ducklings:

Ducks and ducklings

We were visited by some quail recently:

Quail

Yes, the bird feeders will run out too… but they can fend for themselves.

A scrub jay getting some of the last peanuts:

Scrub jay getting peanuts

Scrub jay getting peanuts

GIF of scrub jay getting peanuts:

GIF of scrub jay getting peanuts

Bert flapping his wings:

Bert flapping wings

Ducks on the pond:

Ducks on the pond

Two ducks on the island again:

Two ducks on island

Betty in the grasses, others at the edge of the pond:

Ducks

Betty on the rock:

Ducks

I hope the ducks and chickens all survive this trying time.