Some leafy treats in the morning, misting to cool off in the early afternoon, and escape from the run in the late afternoon!

Leafy treats:

Pool time:

Misting:

Scratching in the mist:

Hey there:

GIF of trying to drink the mist:

GIF of scratching:

In the late afternoon, a duckling squeezed under the gate while rooting in the mud:

She was followed by a couple of others. When I reassembled the run I had bricks under the gate to prevent that, but I removed them as I didn’t think they could fit; apparently I was wrong!

I saw a duckling outside on the cam, and went out there to find three sitting outside the gate; it seems they hadn’t figured out how to get back in. I opened the gate, and they were eager to go back in.

Here’s a picture from the cam of a duckling going under the gate:

From another angle:

Another one going under the gate:

I added the bricks back, so they won’t be able to do that again!

17 photos of ducklings today (I usually aim for 8-10), plus a GIF with those and 25 more taken today.

I started the day by mucking out the duck house, since the straw was getting rather thick and smelly (I normally just add a layer of fresh straw each day):

They were very brave and curious:

A tub of dirty straw, that I lugged to the compost:

I put the base of the waterer back and added some water (the power cord is to slightly warm the water in winter, to prevent it freezing; not needed at present):

Swim time:

Rooting in the fresh straw:

Too close to focus!

Resting Rouen:

Little brown duckling:

Blue Swedish duckling:

Proto-feathers; you can see little feathers on the top and below her wing, and little pins starting at the tip of the wing:

You’re standing on my toes:

Treats:

With them splashing around in the mud, I get rather muddy feet and ankles when sitting in the run with them; I hose myself off when departing (I have my showers in the afternoons, so don’t sit in there after that):

Treats; they prefer lettuce over kale:

Pool time, splashing everywhere:

An animated GIF of all 40 photos taken today (excluding the two cam shots):

Hey duckling fans! Some different angles today, plus a GIF of snuggly ducklings.

Looking down into the duckling run:

Treats:

In the house:

The “little brown duckling” (Khaki Campbell); really should decide on names soon:

The Blue Swedish duckling:

Pool time:

The Khaki Campbell again:

Both of the non-Rouens:

More pool time:

A cute GIF of a Rouen joining her sister on the end of the concrete block:

It’s a hot day today, so I went out to the duck house a few times to refresh their pool water… so I ended up with 40 photos. And just for fun, I’m going to share all of them! But don’t worry, I picked out the better ones as usual, and put a GIF of all of them at the end. So you can look through the better ones and skip the GIF, or jump to the GIF and skip the rest, or enjoy both. Or skip the whole post if you like. You do you.

Leafy treats:

As I showed in a video this morning, today I held the kale and let them pull off bits, which worked out well:

Crouching like that for quite a while wasn’t super comfortable, so on my next visit I added a concrete block with a kneeling pad to sit on, while I refilled their pool and spent time with them (the kneeling pad is mainly to protect my clothing from duckling poop; I don’t leave that in the run):

Ducklings in the pool:

A moth on the duck house:

Lots of splashing:

Later, when the temperature was over 90° F, I used the misting setting on the hose nozzle to help cool off the ducklings, especially the Blue Swedish, who doesn’t go in the pool:

Here’s that GIF of all of today’s duckling pics: