Tag: indian runner ducks

The New Duck Game

~ Crystal Sands ~ 4 Comments

This weekend, our sweet duck, Luna, passed away. She had turned eight in May, and I could see in the last couple of weeks that the end was near. She mostly sat around and didn’t hunt bugs all day like the other ducks. The morning she died, when I let her out of the duck house, she just went to one of the water bowls, took a drink, and stared off into the distance for the longest time. I knew we were in trouble when the turkeys just completely gave Luna her space in the morning. Turkeys are generally terrible at giving people their space. They knew something was up. Turkeys know things, but that’s another post.

This was Luna watching Erin French’s The Lost Kitchen with me.

I miss Luna so much. She spent about three months in the house with us in 2023 when Bairre accidentally ran over her and badly injured her leg. Luna loved to watch television with me. We watched all three seasons of The Lost Kitchen together.

And Luna loved to fly.

When she couldn’t walk after her injury, I would pick her up and carry her from her bin to the bathtub for tub time and then back again. It didn’t take long for her to make a game out of it. She would flap and flap her wings, and I would hold her like she was flying through the air. Pretty soon, she wanted to fly all the time, so I would just carry her around while she flew when she would get antsy.

I am so thankful for that time to really know her. I am so thankful she got three more years on her life. She lived the best duck life, truly, and eight years old is a really good run for a runner duck.

There is more bad news though. Anna Maria is winding down as well.

Anna Maria is the blind duck that I inherited in 2019 after she had been over mated on her farm and was seriously injured. This is quite common when there is not a good balance of males to females in a flock. A few years ago, she went blind from her injuries, and well, I am not going to lie: Her care has been a profound challenge over the years.

The reason it’s so hard for her is because she has very little skin on her skull from her injuries early in life, so even a mild amount of mating from our male duck can cause trouble. This spring, like every spring for the last seven years, I had to change my life to help Anna Maria heal from being mated. Usually, after some time in the house, I am able to let her spend her days with her people but then have to catch her every night, so she isn’t locked in the duck house with our male.

This year was a really tough year though. One day she was fine, and the next day she looked like she had lost her left eye, and I could see her skull. It took a long time to heal her–a really long time. Her body is getting older, and all the things that I had done before to help speed along her recovery just weren’t working. It broke my heart when she started hiding from me at night because she didn’t want to be kidnapped and kept separate from the rest of the ducks, but obviously, she couldn’t be left alone with our male duck until her head healed and our male duck got over his “spring fever.”

Thankfully, she finally started to heal, and it was a good thing. I was so exhausted from everything else plus healing an injured duck that I COVID crashed really, really hard. When you COVID crash, your muscles stop working. It’s from the damaged cells. With long COVID, the cells in your muscles sometimes can’t replenish their energy, and it becomes hard to move. I have crawled up the stairs of this house way too many times in the last two years, but one night after weeks of caring for Anna Maria and then my son who got sick at the first of June, I couldn’t even crawl up the stairs. I remember sitting there on the stairs wondering what was going to have to happen for me to get up the stairs to our bedroom.

I had been thinking of asking Ron about getting more ducks, even though we swore we wouldn’t. But I couldn’t imagine my life without those ducks. Still, sitting there on those stairs for those minutes made me realize we probably didn’t need more ducks.

I finally made it up the stairs with some will I didn’t know I had, and I told Ron about the whole story later–including the part about wanting ducks. It turns out he had been thinking about ducks too.

“The only big trouble the ducks have been have all be related to Anna Maria,” he said. “She’s not a normal duck.”

We both agreed that we would not do a thing differently, that we were both so thankful to know Anna Maria and to see her strength but that she was, indeed, an epic amount of unusual work because she came to us with such profound injuries that would impact her for the rest of her life. The other ducks were pretty easy, outside of some bumble foot, which I now know how to treat very well.

The next morning, I didn’t give Ron a chance to change his mind. I ordered four little ducks from the same farm in California that we had ordered our original ducks from years ago.

For eight years, every night, I have been playing the duck game with the ducks. Every single night of our lives, I fill a white bowl of frozen peas, cook them, add water, feed the ducks, and then chase them around the duck house until they feel like going inside the duck house. They love this game and shake their little tails at me. I can’t imagine my life without the duck game.

In recent weeks, I have been playing a different duck game though. Anna Maria isn’t coming for peas. She’s hiding in the corner of the yard. I know this is a really bad sign, and every night, I get the flashlight and go on a hunt for our little blind duck. I find her, herd her toward the duck house, and once she’s with her people, she eats some peas–until tonight.

I have noticed that Anna Maria hasn’t been eating duck food the last two days. I have tried everything I can. I keep putting food in front of her. I even distract the turkeys and take bits of her favorite treat–Ron’s homemade wheat bread. But she’s not eating that either. Then, tonight, I played my new duck game. I went and found her, herded her toward the other ducks, put down the white bowl of peas, and for the first time in the last seven years since I have been caring for her, Anna Maria did not eat any peas.

I am heartbroken.

I am relieved I have served that duck as well as humanly possible. I have given her a really good life. She has spent her years in a beautiful yard with a pool and peas and people she loved (I mean, not me but her people), and she had her needs met in every way possible. She did have to deal with a male duck, but I worked really hard to keep her safe from him when necessary. Plus, to be fair, Anna Maria has always been a terrible flirt.

And, even though she never forgave me for all the medical treatment I had to give her when she had to be rehabbed when we first got her, she would never want me to tell you this, but sometimes, when she needed help, she would come to me. I would pick her up, and she would put her little head on my shoulder.

Oh, I am heartbroken.

Luna has become a mama’s girl.

~ Crystal Sands ~ 2 Comments

After a solid month of Luna being grumpy at me because she had to stay in the house to heal, she gradually started to turn in a more positive direction toward me. Now, she is a complete mama’s girl, and I am honestly going to have a very hard time when we have to try to move her back outside with the flock in the spring.

Luna and I have learned to communicate well with each other. She lets me know when she has to go potty, and she also lets me know when she’s hungry for peas, is bored, or just wants to be pet. She has also taught me that she loves to fly.

Indian Runner ducks cannot really fly. I have seen them get a little lift-off when they are running and flapping their wings, but they never really fly-fly. Apparently, Luna wants to fly though because we do this thing when I hold her up and she flaps her wings like she’s flying. I carry her throughout the house, and I can tell by the movement in her little muscles which way she wants to go. She stretches her little legs behind her and just goes all in with her flying. It seems to make her very happy, which makes me really happy too. I did have to learn how to keep my hands in a certain spot because those wings flap hard–and they can hurt. I think we have it down to a science though, and my favorite part is when I am lowering her to come in for a landing and she puts her little legs down like she’s lowering the landing gear.

She talks to me quite a bit now and loves me the most. This is a surprise to me after she was so grumpy at me for so long. It’s like she realized I am here to help, and I guess I must be doing a pretty good job. We spend time together almost every evening when I grade papers. I sit and binge watch something on television, and Luna watches it with me. She watched all of Ted Lasso with me, and we just finished Lessons in Chemistry.

She still gets grumpy sometimes though, and we have found that the best babysitter is Bach, specifically the Bach cello suites.

Over the six years we have had these ducks, we have had four ducks in the house for an extended period of time. With each duck, we found that they really loved cello music. Anna Sophia loved it so much that she would come running from different parts of the house to listen to it. For Anna Maria, it was the only thing that could calm her down.

I did tests with each duck to see what they like. I tried different types of classical music. It turns out ducks hate the horns. I also tried country music, rock music, folk music, etc. Bach always wins. Bach and the cello.

In this little video, I captured Luna in her most totally relaxed state listening to the Bach cello suites this week. It’s the best.

Grumpy Duck

~ Crystal Sands ~ 2 Comments

I haven’t written about Luna or anything in a few days because I have been very busy with my new part-time job. My new job is being a duck servant to Luna all day every day.

Luna has not taken well to her life in the house, especially since she had to come back inside due to her bill injury after mostly healing from her leg injury. I think she thought she was home free, so coming back inside full time seemed to take a toll on her. I think she made sure it took a toll on me too. If you have never heard a female duck quack with all of her might, I assure you it’s quite loud. It hurts. And in our old house with wood floors, the quack echoes loudly. My son is very sensitive to sounds, and I am a bit as well, so I try to do what I can to avoid this loud quacking. I have been running and jumping and tending to a grumpy duck for several days now, and I am pretty worn.

My mornings start with having to carry buckets of her tub water out of house because Ron worries about putting a giant duck bath, which is a lot of water, into our septic system. So, every morning, one of us has to carry the water out of the house. It’s usually me because Ron is busy building a fire in the wood stove and when I am done with carrying water from Luna’s bath, Ron has to carry buckets of water out to the outside ducks for their daily water. They use about 40 gallons or so a day, more when the water freezes and we have to carry out more in the middle of the day. Have I mentioned that I will never have ducks again?

After I empty the tub, I put Luna and her nest into my son’s music room and shut the door to keep her safe from our two curious kitties, and then I head out to do the chicken chores. Thankfully, the chickens only require 5 gallons of water each morning, so I carry out 1 bucket to Ron’s 8.

After the chickens are all set, and that takes a good bit, I am back in the house on Luna duty. I scrub the tub and then start the water. I make tea and coffee while that water is running. Oh, and I feed the kitties. Then, I can go get Luna, who is usually quacking quite loudly to let me know she is dissatisfied and needs her morning time in the tub. I have to hold her like she’s flying because she feels better when she “flies” through the house (runner ducks cannot really fly but can certainly flap those wings), and then I bring her in for a soft landing in her tub. She loves the warm water and splashes around so much. That’s pretty much the only time of the day she’s happy.

While she’s doing that, I have to clean all of her dishes and her nest box. I take her old straw out to the duck area, so the outside ducks can use it to keep their feet warm. I get new straw and food and fresh water, and her little nest box is all ready to go for when she finishes tub time.

And that’s just the morning. While I am busy all day trying to work, grade papers, homeschool, cook, and whatever else it is that I do, I am up about every half hour meeting some demand from Luna. The cats are too close. The dogs are too close. She needs to poop (she is amazing and won’t poop in her nest box or on the floor unless she just has no choice). She wants to be with her people. She wants to walk around. She doesn’t like the curtains. The curtains moved. The broom is scary. The wrap for her foot looks like a snake. Snakes are super scary to ducks, I guess. She wants peas. She doesn’t like the red shirt I am wearing. I have to change shirts. She needs fresh water. She needs more tub time. And I don’t even know what else.

On top of this, Ron hurt his back terribly Monday night trying to chop up a downed tree near the chicken yard from the bad storm about a month ago, so in addition to waiting on a grumpy duck, I had to do farm chores by myself all day on Tuesday. I did all of the buckets of water going in and out by myself, and it was so, so hard–and then I got a flu shot–and then I went down, like down, down.

Thankfully, Ron’s back is better because I put my homemade CBD cream on it, and it fixed it! I was so grateful he was better and so grateful I didn’t have to do chores by myself today, especially since it snowed quite a bit. I was so worn this morning, I couldn’t even finish my part of the snow shoveling. Normally, Ron does our driveway because it is long and epic, our son does the back side of the house, and I do the chicken and duck areas. I just barely finished the chicken area this morning when Ron saw me and was like, “You have to go inside.” I would normally argue but not today. I just went inside. The warm fire in the wood stove Ron built was heaven. For a few minutes, I just sat there in front of the fire while Luna was in her tub.

And, in another “thankfully” today, things took a better turn with Luna. She wasn’t nearly so grumpy. The cats can get a little closer without causing alarms, and she is starting to like me now, like quite a bit. She lets me pet her. I tried to sit with her on the couch the other day, and she wouldn’t let me, but I might try it again. I think I’ve won her over.

She barely complained today and seems to like it that we got a new, bigger nest box for her. She seems to understand that I am trying so, so hard. Oh, and she started laying eggs from being in the light so much. It’s great for us but not good for her to be laying in January, so I am trying to make sure she spends more time in the dark. She laid her first egg on Monday, and I was so excited. Then, I realized I was a stupid human who had forgotten that she didn’t need so much light. So I am addressing that, but, truly, the eggs are lovely.

When the snow melts in the spring, we are going to try to slowly integrate her back into the flock using the tried and true method for reintegration where you keep them together for a while but separated by a fence, so no one can get hurt. If that doesn’t work, Luna will have to live in the house for the rest of her life, I suppose. Hopefully, it will get easier. It’s been a tough month or so with this duck. I think we are finally starting to become friends though–or else she just has Stockholm syndrome.

Plot Twist: A Luna Update

~ Crystal Sands ~ 5 Comments

I was all very much prepared to write a blog post this week about my success with Luna. It has been one month since the “incident” with Bairre when he accidentally stepped on her, and her leg has healed quite well. It is still a little off, and she still has a bit of a limp. However, she gets around very well. It really barely slows her down.

Because Luna was reluctant to eat in the house early on, as soon as she was able, I would let her spend time outside with her people, little bits at a time. It helped get her appetite going, and with her leg wrapped up, she could hang with her flock for at least a couple of hours each day. I was amazed that no one was aggressive to her when she would go back outside for visits. I was so grateful because flock aggression is a real issue with our ducks.

This week, Luna was doing so well and the temperatures were warm enough that I decided to leave her outside all day one day. In the evening, I went to check on her, and she didn’t want to come in. I let her spend the night with her people, and in the morning, I scooped her up, gave her a soak in the tub for about an hour, wrapped her leg, and let her go back outside. This seemed to be working so well for a couple of days until one afternoon I was outside with the chickens and heard a terrible commotion from the ducks. I wish I could have run, but there was so much ice on the ground that it took me a bit to get to the ducks. I found a terrible situation. Luna was at the bottom of a pile, and four of the ducks were absolutely abusing her–like severely. Only Ferdinand and Anna Maria weren’t involved.

I ran to her, but she didn’t want to come to me. She took off, so I yelled at the ducks to knock off this nonsense and realized I had better start keeping a very close eye on Luna, though I thought I already was. For the rest of that day and another one, I checked on her about 20 times each day. It was steady. I didn’t see anything else, but yesterday morning, she was acting really strange. I found her away from the flock, and when I went to check on her, it seemed like she wanted me, which was a surprise. I told her I would be right back. I came inside to run a bath for her and went right back to get her. When I put her in the tub, I saw blood on her bill.

I couldn’t figure out what had happened, but after she was in the tub for a bit and her bill was cleaned, I could see the small cracks near the top, where her head meets the bill. I was devastated! I couldn’t believe the other ducks had done this much damage to her, and I couldn’t believe we were here.

A duck’s bill is far more sensitive that you might think. A duck’s bill has highly-sensitive nerves. I have seen the ducks out hunting at night with their bills to the ground. It’s really fantastic to see. Obviously, seeing Luna with a damaged bill was a big worry.

Her bill not only has some small cracks, there is a tiny missing chip from the outer area. I researched about what to do, so I treated her with antibiotic spray to prevent infection. I then had a talk with Ron about what this might mean.

There is a chance Luna may never be able to go back with her people. I found out later from our teenage son that he had to break up an attack on Luna the afternoon before I saw her injury, and he forgot to tell me about it. I told him to please, please tell me when things like that happen.

With these attacks in mind, at the very least, Luna is going to be in the house until spring. I hope we will be able to put her back with her flock, but she is going to have to heal a long time and is going to have to get used to the house right now. Hopefully, we will be able to integrate her back into the flock, but if she gets beat up again, the damage to her bill could be even greater. I don’t know how well it’s going to heal. I don’t know how sturdy a bill will get to be after an injury. I have been trying to research online to get more information, but I really don’t know a lot yet.

All I know for now is that we have to take care of that bill, and Luna is now walking around the house, making herself fairly at home. She’s walking so well now that she won’t stand for sitting her her little nest very much, so she marches those little webbed feet across our wood floors in the cutest manner you could imagine.

Luna’s Day 2 or Rehabilitating a Duck with an Injured Leg

~ Crystal Sands ~ 2 Comments

Luna had a tough day today after a good start to a really tough process yesterday. Her leg is more swollen, and she is not eating. This happened with Ana Sophia though. For several days, she wouldn’t eat very much, if at all. I was very worried about losing her when I finally convinced her back to food with bites of Ron’s homemade whole grain bread. After we got some of that in her, she perked up and did so well. Even though she would have months to go in the house, once we got her to really eat for us, I knew she would be okay.

Because of my experience with Ana Sophia, who broke or severely sprained her leg in 2019 and is going strong still with the flock, I thought I would do my best to chronicle Luna’s rehabilitation process (I mean, hopefully, I can heal her) in the hopes that it might help someone else in a similar situation.

I feel I should first explain why we have not taken Luna to the vet, just in case some are wondering. I have taken a duck to the vet one time and a chicken to the vet one time. The only thing I got that was helpful to me was a prescription for antibiotics, and honestly, I now know that those weren’t the best decision in the situation. I hope this does not sound arrogant, but I knew more than the vet in both situations. I was, honestly, devastated to learn this. I needed someone to know everything I didn’t about the animals I love.

In one case, there was nothing that could be done, as I had thought, and I had to pay the $100 office visit bill. In another case, the vet wanted to do an x-ray on something that I was like 99 percent sure was bumble foot, but it was my very first time to experience it. The x-ray was going to cost $450 on top of the visit and the meds. I paid for the visit and the meds and passed on the x-ray. The vet bill was nearly $300. We had to make the decision that we could not really afford vet bills for all of our farm birds but that we would do our best to learn how to treat everything we could and always consider quality of life for the animal.

I have spent the last ten years reading everything from Facebook posts to scientific journal articles. I took an online class from the University of Edinburgh. I studied our animals as much as I could. There is still so very much I don’t know, but I did help a duck recover from a broken or severely sprained leg in 2019 and have since learned that duck leg injuries are not uncommon in backyard ducks, so I am going to chronicle what I do with Luna and record what works and doesn’t work and hope that most everything works well and that Luna will have many good years in front of her.

I won’t blog about Luna every day, as I will have other stories to tell, but I will chronicle Luna’s journey until she, hopefully, recovers.

On Day 1, she was run over accidentally by our young Per who was playing near the ducks. Ron was there at the time of the incident, so she was put into a soak tub within minutes while we assessed the damage. It is easier to assess leg damage when they are floating and their little legs can dangle. We decided it is severely sprained or slightly broken. Within an hour or so of the incident, we swelling was super noticeable. She did very well in the house the first day, to my surprise. She ate well.

On Day 2, she has been in more pain, so I researched pain management. I read a lot of conflicting information, but without a prescription, most people recommended aspirin. Of course, the internet is like the Wild West, so I kept looking until I found a site I trusted. I looked for something from a university cooperative extension because, truly, they are the best, and I found helpful information from Mississippi State University Cooperative Extension, so Luna now has a dose aspirin, as per the instructions on the site, in her drinking water. I did not use aspirin with Ana Sophia, so I am nervous about this; however, Luna’s leg is worse than Ana Maria’s was. It seemed necessary to do something for Luna’s pain.

As I mentioned before, she has not eaten well at all, so I am hoping a little pain management will help. We have brought her inside to live in the house until she is healed. She stays in our bathroom when we are away from home to keep her safe from our dogs and cats. When we are home, she is either floating in the tub or in her bin where she is in a nest of straw the ready access to food and water. Right now, we are just keeping her off of her leg while also making sure she gets enough tub time to keep her nostrils good and wet throughout the day.

Listening to cello music calms her down a lot, though she was hand raised and knows us pretty well. Still, she is an Indian Runner Duck and, therefore, very high strung in general. This is not an easy experience for her, so we are doing everything we can to keep her comfortable while still living our lives. She likes to be around us and not be alone. Ducks are social animals, so, even though we are not her ideal people, we are still people. She is definitely happier when she is with us.

Those are the key things I can think of right now. Hopefully, they will be helpful to someone, somewhere, at some time. And, hopefully, little Luna will get better. uc

Lucky Number Seven

~ Crystal Sands ~ Leave a comment

We really didn’t want to get another duck, but we now have another duck. I wrote a month or so ago about our ducks going wild. Well, they really, really went wild. They were literally quacking at epic levels at the cars driving by. It got to be so much that we were worried our neighbors were going to complain. Those ducks just never stopped quacking, and female ducks have very, very big quacks.

He is pretty scared of me but making really good progress adjusting to the flock. He also seems pretty chill overall for an Indian Runner duck–at least so far. I’m hopeful.

I decided to ask other duck owners in a Maine duck forum on Facebook for advice. I told the story about our girls, and everyone said “You need a boy.” It turns out that, without a male, a flock of females will resort to quacking for protecting themselves from threats, and as high-strung ducks, a flock of Indian Runner ducks perceive pretty much everything as a threat. Bairre couldn’t go outside at all without chaos ensuing, and he hadn’t chased a duck since he was a baby. Still, the ducks have long memories, it seems.

We were very worried about getting another boy because of Anna Maria, but a young boy is fast. This seemed like our best chance because the girls were so loud, so very loud. So I started a search to find a very young male duck. I didn’t have much luck at first, so I decided to post to the duck forum on Facebook that I was in search of a male duck less than one year old. The responses started rolling in! I decided to just go with the very first response to see if we could make a plan.

It turns out this little boy was one of four boys from this year’s hatch, and goodness knows you cannot have four male ducks, unless you have only male ducks. And, even then, I would be hesitant. Anyway, this woman was so happy to find this little duck a home that she drove him to me.

He’s a gorgeous boy. He’s seven months old. The woman told me he was gray, and he is. However, he’s so unique. He looks like he’s part Mallard. I researched and found out that the gray runner ducks are called Mallard Gray runners and that they are a pretty rare Runner duck in general.

Here, he’s napping with the ladies. You can see Anna Maria on the left. After just three days with him here, the flock is already calmer.

He’s so beautiful that Ron said he was tempted to hatch duck babies next year, but I said we aren’t making any more ducks until we one day live where there are no neighbors at all. He agreed, and I have to say, though I love these beautiful birds, I don’t think I want ducks for the rest of my life. I think all of my worry over keeping Anna Maria safe has just worn me out. Chickens? Yes. Ducks? I’m not so sure.

For now, however, we have a beautiful boy who has landed in a really good situation for a duck. Lots of space. His own ladies. Two Great Pyrenees for protection. Plus, peas every night at bedtime. He’s a very lucky boy, at least he has many fortunate years ahead of him, and maybe he won’t have the same kind of struggles in his older age that Antonio did. I’m going to just hope so.

And we have to think of a name. Right now, I’m leaning toward Seven.

What Happened with Anna Maria

~ Crystal Sands ~ 3 Comments

*Content warning: This post discusses the death of a duck. Please note it is not Anna Maria.

I have decided that I am going to try to go back to writing here every day. First, other social media makes me too sad. My newsfeed is full of animal rescue videos because Facebook’s algorithms are just scary good. Sometimes, the animal rescue videos end happily; sometimes, the videos are sad. When I come across a sad one, I think about it all day and worry and worry about the animal. It’s ridiculous behavior, I know. I am sure the videos are years old anyway. But it’s a struggle I have. Second, I found that writing about our animals and our little farmstead made me happier.

When I quit blogging here every day, I told myself I would keep a journal on my own, where I could write about more than the homestead. Of course, I didn’t do it, so I’m back to writing about the homestead every night. I feel full of good stories right now anyway.

I am going to start with the toughest story to tell because I am dealing with the “Anna Maria situation” yet again tonight. I hoped I would not be back here.

When I quit blogging about Anna Maria in April or May, I didn’t know what we were going to do about her situation. Anna Maria was having to sleep in our house every night. She hated it after a while. On top of this, even putting her out only during the day with Antonio did not work. He was still tearing up her little head. We ended up having to put her in a separate fence where she spent her days alone.

I spent months researching options for the situation that would not have to end in death for one of those ducks. The only option I could find that could work would be building a new area with a new house and get a new duck friend for Anna Maria. We tried separating Antonio some. We tried putting him where he couldn’t even see his girls. But he could still hear his girls. Female runner ducks can be pretty loud. He was hurting himself trying to get to them.

The thought of building a new area and then having additional heavy winter chores for Anna Maria and a friend (and that’s even hoping they would be friends; you don’t know for sure, of course) was too much. I thought about my health struggles and then spent weeks studying Antonio’s behavior to see what in the world was causing this aggression.

It turns out, it was not aggression at all. I spoke to some people online about male ducks getting more aggressive when they got older. Not too many people had older ducks. Most just don’t make it, but out of the few who did, about half reported growing aggression with age. So I studied Antonio to try to figure out what might be triggering the aggression. Was it just his hormones?

I discovered he was not meaning to be aggressive. When he was mating the hens, it was taking a long time for him to be able to “do the deed.” He used to be quick. He was now slow, sometimes very slow. And the act of ducks mating is pretty aggressive. You multiple the amount of time that takes by 10, and there’s going to be some damage. So, there it was. Antonio couldn’t help it, but he was tearing up the girls and going to kill Anna Maria. I am not much for prayer, but I prayed to the land for it to help me know what to do. It was extra difficult to decide because the reality is that Anna Maria could still get picked on by a dominant female, and we would be back to square one pretty much.

Bu I made a decision. I talked to Ron, and he understood and agreed.

We then spent about 8 weeks researching the kindest, most humane way to cull a duck. Ron and I agreed it was too risky to ask someone else to do it, even though Ron did not want to do it. We couldn’t trust others to treat him well. I read blogs and studied anything I could find on the topic. I wanted the impossible. I wanted him to be going along, enjoying his day, and then a second later, be gone.

I will not go into details about the passing of an animal in this space, but I have to tell you it was pretty much that he was walking along, enjoying his day, and then a second later, he was gone. We got so lucky for the best possible way to do the worst possible thing. It’s like Antonio helped us, and I don’t even understand that.

I miss him terribly. As I write these words, I feel some regret. I feel a lot pain. I loved him. And, because of my love for him, I let him hurt the girls too long. I also did not love him enough to make more sacrifices for him in my life, and I feel some guilt about that. Life on the farm is hard sometimes. I do understand why some people do not let themselves get close to the animals, but I believe it’s better to feel pain than nothing at all.

When Antonio was gone, I was able to get closer to our female ducks. He would never let the girls get to close to me. I could see he was starting to make some wounds on two other girls.

I worried the girls would miss him. It’s a hard truth to write, but I am telling you those ducks were so happy. They were a little subdued for about an hour, but by the evening, they were having a duck party. They were playing in the pool without being mounted. They were loud and cheerful. In a few days, the girls were also laying so much better. We went from getting 3 to 4 eggs per day to 5 or 6 eggs per day. These hens are 5 years old! That’s amazing egg production!

It was like everyone was so grateful.

In the weeks after, it was wonderful to watch Anna Maria heal. She’s still blind and still has struggles, of course, but her quality of life was greatly, greatly, greatly improved. This poor duck has suffered in her life thanks to male ducks. As hard as it was to cull Antonio, I am grateful. I love Anna Maria dearly, and I deeply feel for her because of my own trauma in my life. For her, I am willing to do extra. Anything it takes. I’m not sure why other than I feel connected to her.

Anna Maria’s feathers came back so beautifully, and, for the first time in over a year, Anna Maria is able to get treats at snack time. Antonio never let her get anything. It was heartbreaking. It is a joy of my life to watch Anna Maria get some of her favorite treats at snack time. Oh, and she’s been quacking at the back porch when she wants extra snack time. Ron and I always find something. She also gets to sleep with the other ducks, and she doesn’t have to be touched every night by humans who she just can’t fully trust.

However, the night before last, someone was mean to her in the duck house over night. I study her closely every day to keep a close eye on her health. Yesterday, when I let the ducks out in the morning, Anna Maria had some slight injury to her head. This morning, it was worse. Thankfully, the injury was nothing like what Antonio did to her this spring, but I can see where this might be headed. I have to try to nip this.

Tonight, I had to kidnap Anna Maria right after bedtime peas and put her in the garage in a large crate. I thought she was going to be so mad at me. She was not. She leaned into me tonight. I was able to pet her and talk sweet to her. She just let me.

I am sure she will be right back to being grumpy at me in a few days, but tomorrow night, I’m going to see if she will let me pet her and talk sweet to her again when I have to kidnap her after bedtime peas. If she does, I’m going to try to pet her for a long time–just to see what happens.

Sitting Duck

~ Crystal Sands ~ 1 Comment

Well, I just about had a heart attack. Anna Maria was put up in her bathroom nest for the night, and I went outside to give the rest of the ducks their nightly peas. I could only find five ducks! There should be six. There are always six. Every now and then, someone will be slow, but those ducks usually meet me at the porch because they LOVE bedtime peas.

I called and called and called. No duck.

I looked everywhere, but it was getting dark, making it difficult to see much of anything. I went inside to get the flashlight and told Ron what was going on. He had just come in from putting up the chickens and picking up all the food on the property, so I figured he surely would have heard any kind of commotion. He had heard nothing. Still, I could not find that duck.

I took the flashlight outside and looked all over the back area where the ducks live. It’s about half an acre and very sturdily fenced, so I didn’t think anything could get in. There are always the owls, but I saw no signs of an attack.

Finally, I asked Ron to come back outside to help.

“Can an owl carry off a duck?” I asked.

“There would be feathers at least,” he said.

Then, I saw where Ron was heading, and I was hopeful. We have a burn area surrounded by rocks, and it’s full of branches right now. I crawled down and shined the flashlight and there she was! Just sitting there, still as could be. In a little nest she made perfectly amongst the branches.

“She’s trying to go broody,” I said.

When I got her out, I could see she was sitting on a stash of six eggs. She must have decided to go broody just today, as I have seen her every other night without fail. She is tucked into the duck house every night after peas.

Still, just to be safe, I candled all of the eggs. Nothing. Because ducks live so long in the right conditions, we do not plan to get more ducks. It was tempting to think about little ducklings running around though. Tempting indeed. I love baby chicks, but baby ducks melt my heart.

Of course, I am mainly just so glad she’s okay.

Anna Maria was waiting for us.

~ Crystal Sands ~ 3 Comments

Day 345 of 365

It has been a long day, but I have good news: Day 1 of the Anna Maria plan was a success! This morning, I put Antonio in the fenced area and let Anna Maria stay with the other females. They weren’t like super excited to see Anna Maria, but they gave her no trouble. And a few did get close to her sometimes.

Still, Anna Maria was largely alone for most of the morning, and since Antonio was behaving very well in the fenced area, I decided to let him out in the late afternoon. I just stayed with the ducks for a long time to make sure everything was okay.

Everything was really okay! Antonio had forgotten about Anna Maria and really just wanted to roam the duck area again. My plan worked! I do think his hormones may have settled down a bit too, so that was another reason I decided to take a chance.

Anna Maria was safe all day. I was so thankful. Sadly, however, she was also still alone most of the day. She has never fully fit in with the flock, but it seems to be a little worse this year–not just since the incident but really all year. I don’t know if it is because she’s mostly blind or if something else is going on.

But I checked on her and talked to her about a thousand times today. She definitely never runs from me now, which is so cool. The coolest thing happened tonight though. When it was about bedtime for ducks, Ron and I went outside to get Anna Maria, and we found her waiting by the gate where she has been every night since we moved her outside. The rest of the ducks were at the back door. Anna Maria used to wait at the back door. Tonight, she was waiting where we have been scooping her up at night. It was like she was ready to come in!

It was easy to scoop her up. She didn’t run from us at all. Ron showed me the way she likes to be held, so I turned her to situate her on my chest with her head looking over my shoulder. I still didn’t get it just right, but I let her situate herself how she wanted. Once she had her chest against my chest, she seemed to just calm down. I could feel her heartbeat in my chest, and it was not beating super quickly, which I figured was a really good sign that she wasn’t panicking about being held.

I also realized that she could feel my heartbeat. I told Ron that I have had sick chickens and baby chicks also situate themselves on my chest, right over my heart, like the heartbeat relaxes them. Isn’t that cool? I wonder why that is.

This reminds me of the time I had to hold the baby chicks against my chest in my robe. I will have to tell that story soon. Those babies sang to me!

Anyway, Ron told me tonight he has also heard Anna Maria’s tic in the duck house at night and wondered what he was hearing. Now that we know, Ron agrees that Anna Maria is sleeping with us at night for the rest of her life. I am glad we agree on this.

The Anna Maria Plan

~ Crystal Sands ~ 4 Comments

Day 343 of 365

It has been 10 days since Anna Maria was injured and had to be removed from her flock. Because she is so fragile, Ron and I have been back and forth about what to do about her.

For 6 days, she was in the house full time. I hung out with her every day for hours, playing music for her. It was fascinating to see not only what she responded to but also how she responded. I learned in the last 10 days that Anna Maria has a nervous “tic” of sorts. I am happy to report that, over time, I saw less and less of it, but music helped the most. When she liked something, the tic was gone. In addition to cello music (Bach is a favorite for sure), there were some country music songs she liked. She did not approve of Bruce Springsteen’s Dancing in the Dark or Don Henley’s Boys of Summer. She did very much like Maria by Brooks and Dunn. I played it for her because of her name because, a couple of years ago, she learned her name.

Not all of our chickens and ducks learn their names, but some definitely do–like Mary Jane and Rooster. I try to say everyone’s names when I say hello to them in order to see if they eventually learn their names, but I do not spend a ton of time with the chickens and ducks each day (mostly just food and water and treats and egg collecting). I guess the exception is Ruby because, she’s always everywhere. I assume it would take a lot of interaction for the chickens and ducks to quickly learn their names, so it usually takes awhile for anybody to learn.

Still, there is another characteristic of a chicken or a duck who learns their name: It’s that they are curious enough to pay attention to me. For some, I am food, water, and security, but some are pretty curious about me. The fact that Anna Maria learned her name makes me think she has maybe been paying a lot more attention to me than I had thought over the years.

Anyway, I am getting way off track, but maybe it’s important to share those details to see how much I have come to adore Anna Maria extra over the past week and a half.

Ron put some extra fencing around a fenced area at the back of our property, so Anna Maria could go outside during the day. Four days ago, we started taking her outside in the mornings. She is fenced from the rest of the flock but can at least be outside during the day. She seemed so very happy to get back outside. She loves digging her bill into the dirt and hunting around the fence edge for insects. Anna Maria’s joy at being outside made it clear she would not he happy being an inside duck.

So we thought about trying to buy a single female duck to be her companion. Ron would have to build a small duck house for them, and it would mean an additional job in the winter having to shovel snow out of a third area. Ron and I both feel stretched fairly thin most days. We talked and talked, trying to figure out if we could handle more work. Plus, runner ducks live long lives if all goes well. Apparently, they can live 10 to 15 years. Getting a young duck would mean starting that clock over, and while we plan to keep chickens into our old age, the ducks are harder work.

Then, we talked about finding a home for Antonio, which led us to realize that would never happen. People just don’t want an older male duck. Plus, he’s definitely been more aggressive with his mating in the last 2 years. You can’t really give away a duck that might lead to problems for other people. We wondered if we should consider culling him because of his aggression, but we have a hope that this will settle down. He’s getting old enough that his hormones should start to slow a little. We’ll see, but we decided we can’t really choose Anna Maria over Antonio. We just can’t. We love them both, though Anna Maria is definitely the favorite for both of us.

It seems there are no simple solutions, but I think I have an idea that can work. Ron is on board to try, so we are going to try in the morning. The Anna Maria plan is to put Antonio in the smaller fenced area tomorrow and let Anna Maria be with the girls for a few hours. Then, we can let Antonio out and see how he does. We will have to watch closely the whole time. If all goes well, we can try to let them all stay together during the day, but we have decided that, to be safe, for the rest of her life (well, at least as long as Antonio is around), Anna Maria is going to sleep in the house. I think Antonio might get a little aggressive in the duck house.

The first day Anna Maria was in the house with us, I saw her making her nervous tic in the bathtub. She was in the corner and she would move her bill back and forth, over and over and over a million times, each time tapping one side of the bathtub and then the other. It was a constant “thump, thump, thump, thump.” I realized then where I had heard that sound before. There have been times at night when I have been outside near the duck house, and I heard this “thump, thump, thump, thump.” I wondered what in the world this could be. I realized this must have been Anna Maria, and I am heartbroken. That poor girl is nervous out there too–at least at night.

But Anna Maria has good days the flock, so we are going to try her out and see how she does. The plan is to put Antonio up any time he is aggressive and for a few weeks at the first of spring and first of fall, when his hormones really seem to get him wound up. Then, of course, we will bring Anna Maria into the house at night. Hopefully, this will work. Hopefully, Anna Maria is okay. She hasn’t laid an egg in 4 days. It’s a little bit of a concern.

Hopefully, all goes well tomorrow.