More ducklings day 49

The ducklings are seven weeks old today, which means they could be eligible to go in the pond any time now. But I think I’ll give them another few days; they aren’t all fully feathered yet.

Let’s start a little differently this time: with a GIF time-lapse of overnight in the duck house. It is only showing times with activity, so if you notice big jumps in the clock, that’s when they’re sleeping. It’s fun to watch the water level drop in the waterer and tray — ducks drink a lot of water — I fill both when I close up the house, and they’re almost empty in the morning:

GIF summary

You probably saw the post earlier today with their names. Here’s me peeking through a nesting box at the formerly mystery duckling, Silver Swedish Sassa (aka Gimpy):

Silver Swedish Sassa

All of the ducklings… really ducks now:

Ducklings

Colorful Rouen… Rosa, Roxy, Riva, or Ruby… yep, one of them:

Colorful Rouen

I tried giving them bits of tomato as a treat… they weren’t too sure about that. It’s not green!

Tomato

That’s more like it… though my fingers aren’t included in the meal:

Fingery treats

Silver Swedish Sassa somewhat swimming — I tossed her in the pool again, for more reluctant swimming practice:

Silver Swedish Sassa somewhat swimming

Silver Swedish Sassa somewhat swimming

She’s much more clean than she was before; amazing what a short dunk or two will do. Though still got more preening and bathing to fully clean up:

Silver Swedish Sassa

Khaki Campbell Clara, still a bit of feather growth to do:

Khaki Campbell Clara

Clara swimming:

Khaki Campbell Clara swimming

Splashes:

Splashes

Raising out of the water:

Raising out of the water

Two Rouens:

Two Rouens

Two Rouens

Two Rouens

Once again, let’s finish with a GIF summary of all 38 pictures taken today:

GIF summary

Thanks for the feedback from several people. Seems that one second per picture is a good pace, and including all of the pictures provides interesting context. I’m glad you enjoy these, those that do — and if you don’t, easy to skip them at the end.

Video

The Jays love their peanuts

I put a handful of raw whole peanuts in a tray for the wild birds every day. The Steller’s Jays and Scrub Jays love them, hardly waiting for me to leave before diving down and grabbing one or two. They take them elsewhere to open and eat; we find peanut shells under trees all over the homestead.

More duck(ling) names

Back in July I did a post titled “Duck(ling) names”, where I included one picture of the previous batch of ducklings, soon before they went into the pond for the first time, and gave information about their breeds and the names we chose for them.

I’ve been meaning to do that for the six new female ducklings too. So here we go.

As you may recall, there was a mystery about the breed of the duck in the foreground of the following picture. Turns out, she is a “Silver / Splashed Swedish” duck, a less common variation. (Information from the hatchery, and replies to a Reddit post I made; see that for more info.) Not what was expected, but these things happen. I mentioned before that one of the followers of this blog called her Sassa; we like that name, so that is what we’re going with. She will join the Blue Swedish Sven and Sonja.

The other duck unlike the others is the Khaki Campbell, the little brown duck in the center. Our older Khaki Campbells are named Clyde and Cora, again following the convention of naming with an initial letter for the breed, and name from the region of origin. So the new one is named Clara.

Finally, we have four Rouens, which we are naming Rosa, Roxy, Riva, and Ruby. Their male counterpart is Rémy. Though we’ll probably continue to just call them the Rouen girls, since we can’t tell them apart (yet, at least).

Ducklings