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Things Are Ducky On Swallow Lake
- By ContentMart Editor
- Published 01/20/2005
- Animals Pets
- Unrated
Keith, my husband's brother, is the family poultry specialist. He arrived at Swallow Lake with a laughing apology: "I know you said not to bring a housewarming gift." Then he explained he had already promised to bring Gerald this gift of six ducks for our little lake.
The lake was iced at the time, and one duck immediately got herself splee-legged on the ice. Gerald went onto the ice and rescued her, but she was weakened. The next day she was gone. Keith had warned that a coyote or a hawk might have her for his middle-of-the-night snack. Thus, began Gerald's pursuit of successful duck husbandry.
Not wanting anymore caught by the coyotes, Gerald became super vigilant, taking care of the remaining five ducks making sure they had corn and a safe place to go off the ice when the lake completely frozen over. Watching those five ducks became Gerald's premiere winter and spring leisure time occupation and the object of much conversation.
Seeing them line up and swim the length and breadth of the lake leaving the trail of their wake behind them was indeed a beautiful sight. When wild ducks flew in to join them, we became excited and grieved when they flew away.
Despite our pleasure at watching them, I was somewhat nervous when I heard Gerald talking to them from the deck one morning, "Come here, little ducky, ducky, ducky." His summons brought back unhappy memories. Our only foray into raising waterfowl a good many years ago when we lived over at the other farm ended in disaster, and consequently I really do not want our little ducky, ducky, duckies coming up to my patio.
The summer our son got married, Keith had given us two beautiful white geese, which we named Geronimo and Victoria in honor of the bridal couple, Gerry and Vickie. All went well, and we did so enjoy the sight of them on the pond bank by the house. I was even tolerant when they started coming closer and into the garden. But as August and the wedding date approached, they became more and more bold. Soon they were on the porch leaving behind what they could not help, but neither could I help but dislike the leavings. By this time friends were coming and dropping off wedding gifts for the couple.
Our 17-year-old artist daughter Jeannie had been commissioned to do an art project and was being paid for it by our neighbor, who was teaching Lamaze birthing classes at that time. Thus, once more our family room floor was covered as in the past with her artwork. As the gifts started increasing, I opened up a Ping-Pong table in there to display the gifts.
By this time Geronimo and Victoria were very much doing their thing, and friends and neighbors were having to step carefully both on the porch and inside the family room filled with Jeannie's large poster board drawings all over the floor. We had lived with the posters all summer and grown quite used to them as she corrected and added and made yet one more poster for the series of teaching aides. Only after the fact, did we realize that the subject matter--the life-size exhibit of the birth canal and its developing infant--might have been a little shocking to our kind gift-bearing neighbors.
Finally the posters were completed and paid for--Jeannie's first money earned as an artist. The neighbor came and got the posters and even volunteered to take Geronimo and Victoria off our hands and put them on their pond, which was a little further from their house than ours was. I gladly relinquished the geese and the posters. So with these memories in mind, I began to shush Gerald's wooing of the ducks and reiterate that these birds have to stay at the lakeside and not come up to my house.
After one entire family of babies disappeared the first day down at the lake, his winter dreams of all the little ones he hoped to be hatched were foiled. But he got busy with lumber and empty oil drums to create floating maternity wards to keep predators away. Finally succeeding in seeing eggs hatch and then watching those tiny ducks grow into nine beautiful adolescent ducks was a fi
The lake was iced at the time, and one duck immediately got herself splee-legged on the ice. Gerald went onto the ice and rescued her, but she was weakened. The next day she was gone. Keith had warned that a coyote or a hawk might have her for his middle-of-the-night snack. Thus, began Gerald's pursuit of successful duck husbandry.
Not wanting anymore caught by the coyotes, Gerald became super vigilant, taking care of the remaining five ducks making sure they had corn and a safe place to go off the ice when the lake completely frozen over. Watching those five ducks became Gerald's premiere winter and spring leisure time occupation and the object of much conversation.
Seeing them line up and swim the length and breadth of the lake leaving the trail of their wake behind them was indeed a beautiful sight. When wild ducks flew in to join them, we became excited and grieved when they flew away.
Despite our pleasure at watching them, I was somewhat nervous when I heard Gerald talking to them from the deck one morning, "Come here, little ducky, ducky, ducky." His summons brought back unhappy memories. Our only foray into raising waterfowl a good many years ago when we lived over at the other farm ended in disaster, and consequently I really do not want our little ducky, ducky, duckies coming up to my patio.
The summer our son got married, Keith had given us two beautiful white geese, which we named Geronimo and Victoria in honor of the bridal couple, Gerry and Vickie. All went well, and we did so enjoy the sight of them on the pond bank by the house. I was even tolerant when they started coming closer and into the garden. But as August and the wedding date approached, they became more and more bold. Soon they were on the porch leaving behind what they could not help, but neither could I help but dislike the leavings. By this time friends were coming and dropping off wedding gifts for the couple.
Our 17-year-old artist daughter Jeannie had been commissioned to do an art project and was being paid for it by our neighbor, who was teaching Lamaze birthing classes at that time. Thus, once more our family room floor was covered as in the past with her artwork. As the gifts started increasing, I opened up a Ping-Pong table in there to display the gifts.
By this time Geronimo and Victoria were very much doing their thing, and friends and neighbors were having to step carefully both on the porch and inside the family room filled with Jeannie's large poster board drawings all over the floor. We had lived with the posters all summer and grown quite used to them as she corrected and added and made yet one more poster for the series of teaching aides. Only after the fact, did we realize that the subject matter--the life-size exhibit of the birth canal and its developing infant--might have been a little shocking to our kind gift-bearing neighbors.
Finally the posters were completed and paid for--Jeannie's first money earned as an artist. The neighbor came and got the posters and even volunteered to take Geronimo and Victoria off our hands and put them on their pond, which was a little further from their house than ours was. I gladly relinquished the geese and the posters. So with these memories in mind, I began to shush Gerald's wooing of the ducks and reiterate that these birds have to stay at the lakeside and not come up to my house.
After one entire family of babies disappeared the first day down at the lake, his winter dreams of all the little ones he hoped to be hatched were foiled. But he got busy with lumber and empty oil drums to create floating maternity wards to keep predators away. Finally succeeding in seeing eggs hatch and then watching those tiny ducks grow into nine beautiful adolescent ducks was a fi