Tuesday, July 24, 2007

Duckie update



"Well," Hubby said, looking out the window at ducks chasing each other across the yard, "Duckie is definitely a girl."

Oh no, not already.

"Yep. And they're using her topknot to hang on. I think she's missing a few feathers."

Just in the past day or so I'd noticed that Duckie wasn't clinging to Bluebill (Mom duck) any longer. In fact Bluebill made another nest and is sitting on eggs again. So is the female Muscovy, but I think she's already been off the nest too long. She seems to think, especially in the first few days, that it's ok to sit on the nest half the day and then walk about the other half.



In other news, I have a new camera! But in the rush to take pictures before the light faded last night, I didn't adjust any settings, and most of the pictures turned out blurry. (Really, the light had already faded.)

Please let me know if this picture looks too dark on your computer screen. It looks fine on my laptop, but pictures seem darker on our other computer and I'm not sure which one is "normal".

14 comments:

Laura said...

Nice post. We have eight ducks (pekins, cayugas, and khaki campbells) and I'm familiar with the "rituals" you described! Ours can't manage nest-sitting either and, in fact, lay eggs right into our pond. So we've not seen any offspring :(

Faith said...

The picture is a little dark but not so bad I have to strain to see it. I don't think I would have noticed if you hadn't said anything, but now that you mention it, yeah, it does look a little dark.

Anonymous said...

It is not dark on my computer screen. Could just be the way I have it adjusted.

pissed off patricia said...

The pic looks great and it did make me laugh out loud. Bless her heart, that is one hell of a hair/feather do she's sporting there. Not being a bit familiar with the habits of duck mating, I've learned something here.

meresy_g said...

Adorable duck. That little top knot just makes me smile. Ducks are much cuter than chickens.

Anonymous said...

Nice photos! So, what camera did you get? (Am I the first to ask this most important of questions?)

dmmgmfm said...

It looks great. Congrats on the new camera!

Rurality said...

Thanks everybody. I may do a "which one looks better" test later on.

We don't really *need* any ducklings - especially more males - but maybe we can give them away if we get too many.

I need to get a pic of the other poor female duck's neck. They've plucked her!

I got the Nikon D200 camera. A bit of a splurge, but it was my half of the unexpected tax refund! :)

Ontario Wanderer said...

Photo was fine on my desk computer and it is usually darker than our laptop. (Is there such a thing as a "normal" computer? I think they are all different. Besides that, colours look just a bit different in my right eye and left eye. Again, one darker than the other.)

Anonymous said...

Looks good to me, on my big fat fancy iMac monitor.

Congrats on the mew camera!

Trailhead said...

I'm still getting used to my new D200, but so far I'm absolutely loving it. Hope you like yours too.

Shady Gardener said...

So, I want to know what kind of duck "Ducky" is. She should be the star of a childrens' book!

R.Powers said...

The duckian world is full of absurdity, but that picture captures the essence of duck silliness.
The pic is barely darkish.

Walter Jeffries said...

That's quite the face. Our ducks are just Pekins - or were, we ate the last recently. I would like to get more.