The ducklings are fine

The ducklings are fine: growing apace and living quite happily in the pen. Overnight they go into the duck house with the big duck and they now seem to coexist together without any friction. Interestingly, a few days ago our current guests witnessed the big duck flapping about outside the pen to frighten off some predatory magpies that were chattering around too near the ducklings - so her maternal instinct has finally switched itself on!

The little ones are still very sweet to watch, with their fluffy downy feathers gradually shedding now as their adult feathers come in. They are very, very nervy and run away in their little group if you go too close, or when you change their water or feed them or adjust the sheet over the pen that shades them from the sun. Then they stand very still, listening, until they decide that they are safe, and one by one they sit down, which they do with a kind of folding, collapsing motion of their legs. I don't remember the first lot of ducks we had being this nervous, but maybe they were. We'll let them out into the big wide world soon, under supervision and with Maxim the duck-eater well out of the way.

Nothing more to report on ducks right now.