Today I reassembled the fenced run for the latest ducklings. I got a bunch of pictures that will be in today’s ducklings blog post. Here are two clips: playing in the mud, while Betty quacks at them, plus using the paint tray pool.
Pond
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:
The reverse angle, with the shop, hoop house, veggie garden, back lawn, pond, and flowerbeds:
Closer to the pond, with the ducks visible; they weren’t sure what to make of the strange noisy bird hovering and flying nearby:
Another angle of the pond and ducks:
And another:
GIF of flying upwards from the pond:
One more from lower down; I think this is the first time I’ve hovered over the pond:
The flowerbeds and white gazebo:
Beehives, greenhouse, veggie garden, chicken coops, hoop house, back of shop:
Veggie garden:
Hops taking over the top of the berry cage:
The berry cage and weather wind speed and direction sensors:
Mount Hood is looking a lot less snowy at this time of year:
Zoomed in on Mount Hood:
Flock Friday for August 28
Welcome to another Flock Friday!
Let’s begin with an animated GIF of ducks and fish at night:
Ducks on the pond bank from different angles:
Some ducks headed up the ramp to the duck house, even though the pop door is closed:
You can just make them out from the other cam too:
Ducks on the pond:
Night ducks:
Chickens waiting for treats:
Chickens with treats:
Finally, the ducks on the opposite side of the duck house from normal:
Flock Friday for August 21
For Flock Friday this week, more sad news, I’m afraid. One of the two Rouen ducks went missing on Sunday night. I don’t know what happened to him — I saw him on Sunday, and haven’t seen him since, not even a body or signs of a struggle. So if a raccoon or something grabbed him, it must have dragged him somewhere else.
Anyway, on with the pictures. Here are the ducks messily eating, with one of the Rouens in the foreground:
Ducks by the duck house, and (not really visible) ducklings inside:
A GIF of one of the Rouens exiting the pond:
Splashing to cool off on a hot day:
It was very hot (mid-90’s) over the weekend, so we gave the chickens a frozen treat of corn and peas to help them cool off:
Ducks eating again:
Camilla snuck into the veggie garden when I opened the gate:
Ducks with treats; the last photo of both Rouens:
On Sunday, the chickens with another frozen treat:
Looking at the pond cam, 8 ducks visible on Sunday evening:
The next morning, only 7 ducks; I couldn’t see any evidence of what happened to the second Rouen:
We had two names for the Rouens, Rémy and Raoul, but hadn’t decided on which was which. But now that we only have one, his name is Rémy. RIP Raoul.
Seven ducks eating:
I went to the feed store for more duckling food. I’m well stocked now; a couple of spare bags of duckling food (the red ones at the back), plus many bags of chicken food, fish food, and mealworms, in the storage area of the new chicken coop (I might need to add another shelf):
Sleepy ducks:
Night ducks:
Ducks on the bank:
This morning, a visit by a blue heron:
Flock Friday for August 14
As with the previous batch, I will post separately about the newest ducklings. These Flock Friday posts will include the older ducks and chickens.
Before I closed up the duck house for the new ducklings, the older ducks had only been going in their house to eat:
Down the ramp:
They are now being fed in this temporary food dish; they’ll have access to the house feeder again once the new ducklings are grown:
Ducks on the pond:
Chickens heading to bed:
Ducks on the pond again:
And on the pond bank:
GIF of a Rouen flapping his wings:
Sleeping on the pond:
And sleeping on the pond bank:
Chickens with treats:
Stealing lettuce I’m holding for the ducks, while I’m crouched to take pictures:
Duck treats:
Under the shade:
Ducks eating from the temporary food dish:
And some food scattered on the ground:
GIF of ducks eating:
Submarine duck:
Cleaning out the duck house and mounting the run gate
Welcome to season three of the Yellow Cottage Homestead Ducklings show!
We begin this season, like the previous one back in May, by cleaning out the duck house in preparation for the new ducklings, due around Thursday. [Update: probably Wednesday.]
Here’s a cam shot of the duck house before cleaning it out:
I started by raking out the straw and spilt food (ducks are very messy eaters):
I then hosed it out; I designed the duck house to be fairly waterproof with this in mind:
Wet duck house:
More hosing out:
I left the duck house empty for now, so it can dry out:
I left the food in the tube, since that is still duckling food from the earlier batch (they get starter feed until 18 weeks old). The new ducklings won’t be able to reach it for a couple of weeks, but can eat from the tube when they can.
In a couple of days time I will finish setting it up for the new ducklings, with shelf liner on the floor, the duckling feeder and waterer, EcoGlow, and heat lamp. I’ll probably do a separate post about that, but it’ll be similar to last time. [Update: nah, not much point posting about it; you’ll see the setup when you see me add the new ducklings.]
Next, I installed a proper gate pole. The duckling run is temporary, but since I’ll want it again for the second set of ducklings, I’ll be keeping it around for probably at least another ten or so weeks, so I figured I might as well install a proper pole to hinge the gate:
The pole is set in concrete, from when it was elsewhere in the garden, so I just dug a hole and poked it in. It’s pretty sturdy.
It’ll be easier to open the gate now. It has hinges on the left and a latch on the right, just like a real one:
The rest of the run fencing is still acting as a shade for the older ducks; I’ll restore the enclosure once the new ducklings are old enough to use it in about three or four weeks time:
The ducks were supervising my work:
Flock Friday for August 7
Welcome to the first Flock Friday with the new ducks. Plus chicken pictures, of course.
As you probably saw in the previous post, we have ordered seven more ducklings, all female this time, to address the gender imbalance of the ducks. They will probably arrive around Thursday next week, so I will resume the daily duckling posts with them at that time, and will feature the older ducks in the Flock Friday posts going forward.
Again, you can read all of the previous duckling posts from the beginning via the “ducklings 2020” tag on this blog. And the second batch of ducklings will be tagged “ducklings 2020 again”.
On with the show; here are the chickens waiting for treats:
Chickens with rice treats:
An animated GIF of Sven and Betty on the ramp from the duck house, Bert flying into the pond to chase Sven, then Betty emulating and distracting him:
Some still images from that:
Duck treats:
Bert, Betty, Raoul, Rémy, and Sven:
Sonja, Sven, and Clyde:
Ducks eating in the duck house:
The non-Buffs hanging out on the pond edge:
A GIF of Sven hesitantly sliding down the rock slide:
On morning rounds today, Flo snuck through the gate from the chicken run into the veggie garden; she quickly realized the error of her ways, and I got her back through the gate after a minute:
Ducks eating in the duck house again:
Enjoy that while you can, ducks — I’ll be closing up the duck house this weekend, in preparation for new ducklings. I’ll feed the older ducks from a dish next to the pond. More on that another day. Stay tuned for the exciting bonus season of duck TV!
Ducklings day 63: lonely Sven
Did you see the video of Cora sliding into the pond? That was taken by Jenn, and was rather amusing. Based on the track down the rock, they seem to use that route a lot, which isn’t surprising, since it’s near one of their favorite hangout spots.
From this morning, some ducks in the pond:
A Rouen rising up out of the water:
Here’s a GIF of that; also rather funny, like riding a unicycle:
Over in the deep end, with poor Sven hiding amongst the grasses on the edge:
He doesn’t get to hang out with the others when Bert is on the case:
Bert chasing Sven back to the edge:
Sven separated again:
Lonely Sven:
Duck slide into pond
Betty and a Rouen wrestling, then Cora uses a rock to slide into the pond. It looks like that’s a frequent route.
Ducklings day 62
Read an interesting blog post about ducks this morning, where her advice was to have only one or two male ducks and more females. Oops. As she said, male ducks can be real jerks. Not looking at anyone in particular, Bert.
Morning ducks:
Treats on the bank:
They enjoy this grassy patch:
Heading into the house:
Breakfast time:
Poor Sven keeps getting chased away by Bert:
