How Minna became a house duck. Again.

Minna started out life as a house duck, along with Maggie, but several years ago the parental units had decided that they had had enough and the ducks were exiled to the backyard and the newly built duck coop. They lived outdoors successfully enough for the last several years, and the majority of our little flock lives out there still, in The Duck Coop: The Sequel (we recently built a second, larger, nicer one.) Two of our ducks, however, have made a return to the house - Gracie and Minna. 

Gracie is able to spend her days outdoors where she drives the boys insane by remaining sequestered in the duck run where the boys are unable to reach her. This is especially hard on the boys during the spring time when hormones are running high among the young drakes, but for Gracie's comfort and safety she needs to be left alone and not jumped on multiple times a day. Or hour, as the case may be. 

Minna is another story. We noticed a year or so ago that she was having trouble moving around and would often end up sitting in one place for the majority of the day. A trip to the vet revealed that she has nerve damage and can't get around easily, leaving her at the mercy of the weather, the other ducks, and the chickens. So it was decided that for her comfort and safety she would rejoin us in the house. The years have not been so kind to her and she is starting to show her age, as she is now a little over 13 years old and currently both her knees are dislocated, in addition to her nerve damage. 

She now spends much of her day resting on a dog bed covered in puppy pads, going outside in the duck run for short periods of time, eating her meals in the bathroom using a feeding platform to allow her to be at standing height without putting pressure on her knees, getting treats like blueberries and peas (some of her favorites) and taking a daily bath in the bathtub to keep her clean and happy. I would let her spend more time driving the young drakes crazy with Gracie, but the vet recommended she spend her time on mostly soft surfaces so that she doesn't develop the equivalent of bed sores, which would shorten her life. And before you ask, the vet has already stated that she would not recommend putting Minna to sleep at this point and I can't bear the thought of letting her go before she may be ready. 

Minna (on her feeding platform) and Gracie, enjoying some duck chow

In addition to making her a feeding platform out of fabric and PVC pipes, I have also made a wheelchair in much the same way, with the addition of wheels and a handle, so that when the weather finally turns nice I can take her out for little walks in the neighborhood to let her nibble at plants and enjoy the sunshine. And fear not for our reputation: the neighbors already know we're crazy.

Scout can't resist getting in the picture with Minna's new wheels

All grown up, and limping along

Well, it wouldn't be life on the Unfarm without at least one thing going wrong with our new ducklings. I think we must attract special needs animals. In this case, Gracie started limping not long after she hatched. Taking her to the vet - multiple times - finally led to a diagnosis: the tendon in her knee had slipped out of the groove it is supposed to stay in, leading her to start limping as the muscle pulled the leg into an awkward angle. 

We did everything we could for her: we tried physical therapy but she decided that she was going to be the first duck in the history of ducks who does not like swimming, which was what she needed to do for her PT. I tried anyway, and I gave her all the recommended medications and kept her from running around on the leg too much and separated her from the boys so no one would try mating with her, putting too much pressure on her body. At one point, she was even wearing a little boot the vet made for her. We even sprung for an experimental knee surgery with our veterinarian: they put pins in her knee to hold the tendon in place with the hope that should would make scar tissue that would hold the tendon in place when the pins eventually had to be pulled out. Spoiler alert: she did not. 

Gracie in her boot, out for a stroll

So where are we now? Well, Gracie is all grown up and still limping, and her leg is bent at an angle so she can't put all her weight on it, and she spends her nights in the house with Minna, our house duck, (a story for another time) but goes outside in a separated run during the day in nice weather. For now she doesn't appear to be getting any better - and I don't expect her to - but neither does she appear to be getting worse. So I make her life as easy and comfortable as possible and hope that she can continue on much as she has been - limping but not uncomfortable - and enjoying the best of both worlds, indoor and out. Fingers crossed she holds steady, as we are, after all, experienced with special needs pets, and I would rather deal with a limping duck than the alternative which would be to have her put to sleep.

A tale of two duck nests... and the ducklings that followed

A couple of months ago, Gwen went broody and started sitting on a nest she had carefully concealed in the coop. She dutifully sat day in and day out on the nest and spent her time rotating her eggs and building up her nest until it was roughly the size that would comfortable house an eagle. And it didn't just stay in one place, no, that would be too simple. So every few days she would move the entire nest and all the eggs inside it to somewhere else in the coop. To say she was industrious would be understating it. On the few occasions when she did leave the nest, to get something to eat or drink or just run around the yard for a few minutes, she would carefully cover the nest back up with straw, and often threw some over her shoulder for good measure on her way out the door. 

About halfway through with her nesting I noticed that there appeared to be two nests in the coop and some of the eggs had migrated into the new nest. Not wanting the eggs to get too cold, I put them back into the bigger nest and then left the coop alone so that Gwen could nest in peace when she got finished with her free time. And yet, each time I was able to check the coop the eggs would be divided up again. It seemed that one of our other females, Gemma, had decided that going broody was apparently the "in" thing to do so she joined Gwen in the coop. 

Now there were two nests that migrated around the coop, making a kind of circuit, going from the back right corner to the center right to the front, moving from right to left, to the center left side. They were in the process of moving into the back left corner of the coop when I noticed, during one of their brief breaks from the nest, that one of the eggs had pipped but was slightly crushed and bleeding in places from the shell. I decided at that point that one of the mothers - probably Gemma as this was her first experience going broody and she is heavier than Gwen - had likely stepped on the shell and the duckling inside was going to need help. I removed the egg from the nest and gave some slight assistance in helping the duckling to hatch enough to be able to breathe and get out on their own. Adina, as I named her, hatched with the yolk still attached by the umbilical cord so I left her alone, keeping her warm and letting her rest while I hoped the cord would take care of itself in a matter of hours or days. She survived that way for a few days but passed away on the third day. 

Gwen and Gemma on their nests

Gwen with little Gracie, the day I found her

A few days later, Gracie hatched - strong and healthy and peeping away in the coop one morning. I decided to let her stay with her mom and see if Gwen could manage to raise a duckling. When I went out a day or two later to shoo Savannah (our poor little battered hen that Lilly loves to pick on) off the deck I noticed a little yellow speck on the patio. Gwen had, apparently, decided it was ok to let Gracie wander the patio by herself, surrounded by chickens and other adult ducks and a whole lot of yard to get lost in. Nope. Not happening. I set up the brooder in the house and popped her in it.

Gracie

Harley

Olive

Harley hatched next, and then Olive. Little Zaida hatched fourth, with the umbilical cord still attached and I didn't think she was going to make it, as she kept trying to push the shell away from her while it was still attached. I left her in the brooder, separated from the rest of the ducklings, and went to sleep. I was amazed to find her alive in the morning, and no longer with the umbilical cord attached. And after finding several more ducklings that had died in the coop, pipped too early or pushed out of the nest while hatching, I decided to set up the incubator for the last viable egg in the coop. It had started to pip so I didn't do any turning, but left it alone in the incubator and found it totally hatched a couple of mornings later. Abigail appears to be the last of the ducklings. 

Zaida, our miracle baby

They are all in the brooder in the house now, and doing well. They love water, and kale and watermelon for treats. At the moment, they are all different sizes and each has slightly different markings but I don't know how long that will last for. We still aren't sure if Gemma is a mallard or a rouen duck but we do know that Gwen is a magpie. Fern, our older male, is an ancona duck and Rosie is our younger male and a magpie/ancona cross. So the ducklings are some mixture of magpie/ancona or mallard-rouen/magpie/ancona breeds. Gracie is for sure a magpie mix, and I suspect Harley is as well... Olive is less certain, and Zaida and Abigail could have some mallard-rouen in their heritage. All of our birds are given girls names, in the hopes that they will turn out to be females. That's how we ended up with drakes named Fern and Rosie, and roosters named Lilly and Gretchen. 

To say that my parents are thrilled with this duckling development would be a lie. They are, in fact, much dismayed to find that we have five new ducklings. I'd like to point out, however, that it could be worse: all 14 of the eggs in the nest could have survived and hatched. Let's count our blessings. 

Abigail