New Friends!

Well...

What can I say...

The truth of the matter is we are incubating 6 duck eggs and 4 goose eggs ~ thanks to generous friends (along with numerous chicken, turkey, and guinea eggs from our own existing birds) right now anyway...

So, why not? Right?

This is what happened:

We went to my Dr. apt. on Friday and when we got out we went straight to a farmers market over in the Orschland parking lot in Marshfield. It was a very wet day, as all the days over this past week plus have been, and the older two children and I went over to Orschlands leaving Bob tending to our table at the market. Being pregnant I had to piddle, of course. Great excuse for heading to the store!

Everyone knows that it is "chick days" there. Who can keep away from their cute peeping anyway? I went right for the big bins hoping they would have goslings or turkeys at a reasonable price.... but no, they only had goslings and they were about $12 each. So, I would wait for the eggs we have here to hatch and then maybe ask the lady that gave us them for some more if that worked out well and I wasn't too bored with turning eggs and watching temperatures. The type of goose she has is a cross, as I understand, between a large white goose and a Japanese goose which is large, white, with a long neck and a little flap under the chin. She said they will be a long necked large white goose. They sound just lovely!

Incubator tally: The chicken eggs are halfway there as they only take 21 days. The duck and goose eggs were put in a little later and have about 21 days left out of 28. The majority of the turkey eggs are 14 days from hatch at this point. I look forward to all of the eggs hatching, but especially the poults (baby turkeys) since one of my wee female Royal Palms got eaten this past Wednesday (I cried off and on for hours ~ she was my favorite).

Anyway... Miranda found the little ducklings first and fell head over heals for this little black cutie. It was so quiet and sweet up in her arms. So, I took a look. Now, I have to say.... I only had $5 on me so, I wasn't really in the market to make a purchase, had really attempted to keep my hands off, but there we were now both holding peeping little ducklings and then Robert came over from sitting on the 4-wheelers, which were conveniently parked next to the chicks, and he started to hold one of them. Well, you can't just get one of anything and so there we were... box with bedding in hand and Miranda and I each holding a black one and a brown one. The guy in charge of the wee ones came over to help another customer and then I asked him what varieties he thought that each might be (I had been frantically looking over a "duck" book just before his arrival and could not figure it out for lack of pictures). Well, he says: " The little brown ones are most likely Khaki Campbell and the little black ones are just beautiful when grown with an iridescent green feathering, but I'm not sure which breed they are." After pulling the duck book back out we discovered that the KC would weigh 3-4 pounds and could lay 300-350 eggs per year. Nearly one a day! And being a brown bird I knew that Bob would quickly fall for them for that reason as well as their egg laying ability.

Then the search was on for the black beauties. There are two possibilities: The East Indies and the Cayuga. I believe it is the later because that is what is available at Cackle Hatchery (the other is super rare) and while I don't know for certain where these wee ones came from it only makes sense they came from there since the hatchery is only 30 mins +/- away from the store. When we got home I looked things up on the internet and I'm 99.9% sure that is what we have. They are also descent egg layers that lay about 100-150 blue/green colored eggs and weigh in at around 7.5 pounds and are considered a quiet duck. hmmmm.... we'll see.

Both breeds forage quite well and will not require a whole lot in the way of feed once they are a bit older. Ducks in general are quite fast growing, so, the 10 gallon aquarium we have them in for now will not last long ... maybe this next week and we will have to switch them over to the old guinea brooder which is being cleaned by the rain as I am typing. Heehee.

Ducks are supposed to reign supreme when it comes to eating bugs, slugs, and vegetation. So, we will have to keep them out of the garden, but they should help keep the population of bugs down. They will also be a lot easier to put up at night than the Guinea are. We can't really put them up... they just roost high in the barn and we hope for the best. We lost one of them a couple of weeks ago to what we think is a racoon, that has taken 5 of our feathered friends in the past 2.5 weeks. sad. However, the ducks will have a moving house and run area and then be let out when the weather is nice and have fun with the kiddos. I'm sure there will be pictures of Miranda "swimming" with her ducklings in the turtle pool and eventually in the big tub we have set up for the kids to cool down in. (eye roll) That is if it ever stops raining!

In then end we settled for two black and two brown. I have a feeling we will be in the market for more of the KC. I can't believe the nutritional value of the duck egg! Hope Jacob enjoys them as they will be his new fare once we start seeing them later this year ~ that is if we don't have all drakes!

Here is the link comparing the chicken to the duck egg nutritionally: http://www.duckeggs.com/duck-egg-nutrition-compare.html . Nearly everything is UP from the chicken egg and especially the specific Amino Acids that his Dr. said would help him out.

On that note... take a look at this!

Yes, that is Jacob pulling himself up at the side of Miranda's bed! Guess he had to move to a taller object than other "toddlers" might use since he is so tall himself now. It was so exciting watching him. He was really intrigued by Miranda's multitude of dolls and critters she has up there he wouldn't stop until he got the exact one he was looking for. There is NO stopping him! He was giggling and having so much fun!