Sunday: Duck report

It’s time for a Sunday Duck Report. Esther’s brood hatched on May 6, and so today they are 26 days old, coming on to four weeks. As we’ll see at the bottom, in the last week or so they’ve started growing their feathers.

Here are some videos and pictures of the brood, most taken around May 20 when they were two weeks old.

The brood (still six):

A swimming duckling. They are starting to look like big ducks, though they still have their baby down:

A diving duckling. It’s learning a skill that will help it not only forage, but also escape predators:

They get fed two or three times a day and are coming quite close to us. (I whistle for them, a call that they recognize as “feeding time,” but all I really have to do is show up at the pond with my bag ‘o duck food, and they coming swimming towards me rapidly.)

By the way, they get a good diet: Mazuri duck chow, which is a complete diet. Esther and big ducks get big pellets (I get this in 50 lb. bags), while the babies get the same thing, but in smaller pellets since their bills are too small to engulf the big ones (this “waterfowl starter chow” I get in 25-lb bags).  As a special treat, they get freeze-dried mealworms, which are high in fats and protein. This is their favorite food, but it’s a dessert, not the main course.

They love to enter the plastic tubs that used to be used as supports for the “plant cages”. I think of it as a duck spa:

Here are two ducklings, their swollen craws making it obvious that they just ate. They store some of the foot they eat in their esophagus.

About a week ago, the ducklings and Esther climbed up the southern “ramp” on the east side of the pond, where they’d sun themselve and then, going further into the brush, would all rest together. Here they are approaching the ramp that leads to their resting spot.  Esther always leads the way, but sometimes the brood is reluctant to land as they still want to swim and play:

More recently, since the babies have gotten large enough to jump directly out of the pond onto its edge, they like to do that together and sun themselves on the cement. Esther, of course, is always nearby.

Having a good rest:

Sometimes they pile up a few feet away from mom, but she’s always nearby. The piling up keeps them warm, as it’s been a bit chilly lately.

A video showing their postprandial resting on the edge of the pond:

A pile o’ ducklings:

Finally, in the last eight days or so the babies have been sprouting their feathers.  Feather appearance starts at the tail, in which a few tiny feathers make the tail look like a paintbrush:

. . . then the feathers start sprouting on their wings (arrow). Next stop: scruffy-looking “punk ducks” with a mixture of feathers and fluff.  Stay tuned for that!