Duck Tales! (Still not what I expected to wake up to this morning)

[AlanThePig]

With the last thread almost full and a new clutch of ducklings I thought it might be time for another thread.

So this morning I was happily working away in the front garden when I happened to glance at the duck house, and saw two faces staring back....
Now I know our resident duck Egwina was on eggs, but I was convinced they were due to hatch somewhere around the end of the month. Quite surprised to spot ducklings.

As the day has worn on 14 little fluffy yellow ducklings have slowly emerged into the sunlight and launched themselves (not very gracefully) into the water. I say 14, I'm not 100% certain yet as they aren't keeping still enough to count and there might be more inside.

Difficult to photograph all together at present as some are in and some are out and they haven't yet come close enough to see. There was 12 (I think!) in this photo and 2 on the deck.
Congratulations Egwina!

You know when I said it was all quiet....

Sat in front of the telly watching Max take another F1 win when I notice a few kids at the bottom of my drive. I go down to see whats up and they have a rather small, skinny little hedgehog. Credit to the kids they have realised that this isn't right and alerted us.

Spent best part of this evening transporting said hog to local rescue where he's been assessed and is in a bad way. He's a November baby, underweight, riddled with parasites and covered in fly strike. He's had his spines combed through, is in a warm incubator and has fluids. If he survives the night they can try and get him strong enough for antibiotics. If he recovers he can come home and be rereleased, but thats a rather big if sadly.

So as a reminder, if you see a hedgehog in the day, it needs help! Please feed them, cat food or dry cat biscuits will do if you don't want to buy hedgehog food.
Everything crossed he makes it. I'd christened him Snoop Hoggy Hog but the rescue have a set list of names so he became a much more sensible 'Teasle'.

Awwww amazing! Well done kids. Welcome Teasle! Hope he gets better soon 🤞

I’m a bit sad I don’t know where they came from, I’d have liked to have been able to knock on and thank them.
lovely kids though, really interested in the pond and the wildlife. I shall have to keep an eye out for them now.

meanwhile I’ve sent a few things from the rescues Amazon wish list to help. Im always so amazed by these people who have sheds in their garden full of injured wildlife.

@AlanThePig thanj you for posting on my thread about helping hedgehogs and reminding me of your duck tales. Well done to the children and to you for getting Teasel the help he so desperately needed.

watching for your next wildlife tale

So glad this thread is back! I hope little Snoop made it through the night, will they let you know how he's doing?

If he recovers we will collect him and release him back here into an area he knows. It's a big if sadly, he is very poorly and weighs under 300g.

I learned about fly strike yesterday and it was quite sad.
Poor little hog is covered in it on his belly, it's because the flies realise he's dying so lay their eggs ready for a meal when he's gone. Natures way I guess. The lady at the rescue sat with a nit comb and combed all his belly through to remove the eggs.
I'll give her a call tonight and find out how the little guy is doing.

I hope Snoop Hoggy Teasel gets home to you. We have a couple of hogs that pop in 3 or 4 nights a wk they leave loads of black hog poos
We leave water out, but can't leave cat food or it gets pilfered by NDNs cat. I always feed the birds (mum and baby seed, mealworms, suet and sultanas) before bed/dusk so they have breakfast. Judging by last night, the blackbird had supper too <singing "I can see you" to me from the roof). I suspect the hogs make the most of it too.

Well, the little guy is fighting. Take each day at a time but he's still alive. ❤️

So happy to hear your update on Teasel @AlanThePig he’s a champion fighter.

There's a duck thread? Who knew? 😁

I walk around this reservoir every day.

@AlanThePig how totally lovely to hear from you, although I'm over-invested all over again ... 😍

Lovely to hear from your house of ducks!

I must admit I’m not enjoying the quiet. It’s strange not having the ducklings. The moorhen chicks are as skittish as their parents so don’t really come to the door for food like the ducks do. Hopefully once they have raised this clutch, wherever they are, they will return.
we still have the odd visitor, four males dropped in briefly for dinner but then left again.
I purchased a sign for the gate, which made the postman laugh anyway.

Do you think the dinner guests were previous ducklings, or just random passing ducks?

I was thinking of you the other day when I saw a male mallard duck in a really weird location (on a grassy roundabout at a motorway junction). I suppose in duck terms it was quite a good place to rest temporarily as the constant traffic would keep predators like foxes away.

Moorhens are vicious with babies but not as much as coots

I would rather go near a goose than I would with a coot with babies

They are straight up nasty.

Im also known among friends as the hedgehog lady. Raised a few babies by bottle feeding

Shame Egwina has had a tantrum and laid her eggs elsewhere.

Hopefully she bring her babies to the pond as normal

I sadly don't have ducks in my garden but live near a great place (Kelsey Park) which has a plethora of ducks, geese etc. Have seen many Egyptian geece goslings, Canadian geece goslings and normal duck ducklings at the weekend. The faves have been the heron babies which have been seen this spring and are like mini pterodactyls to look at with strange cries too. Have also seen coot babies and this weekend saw the normal duck mum see off the coot parents with the slightly older coot baby!

Lovely to be reminded of this thread and catch up on the Duck Tales.

Fingers crossed for Snoop Hoggy Hog (I refuse to call him anything else since that is a most excellent name!).

@BlackAmericanoNoSugar I always assume previous ducklings if they come over to the door for food, and these did so very possibly so. I never cease to be amazed where ducks will take up residence or stop for a rest. It’s not an unusual sight to come home to a row of them on the front fence…

@Soubriquet moorhen did attack the cat the second time it tried for a baby. I think cat has probably now got the message.
I’d hoped they may have mellowed towards us over time but they won’t come for food until we’re gone so they really don’t trust humans.

@GonnaGetGoingReturns fascinating things to watch aren’t they? I’m still not a fan of geese, far too destructive on a smaller pond for me, happily their visits this year have been quite brief.

@NiqueNique i preferred snoop too, but the lady has themed names, presumably to keep track of what comes in and when, so he had to change. Hopefully he’ll come home and can resume being snoop 😂

Looking forward to keeping an eye on your thread this year!!.
Very heart warming on a rubbish day!!. Hope Snoop makes it.

I think the cat took another moorhen chick this morning. Our gate alarm went at 7am and CCTV caught a man popping a box on the drive and a small, stupidly fast, black shape bolt out of it. I think it's cat owners son from the next street but can't be sure. Been trying to see how many babies we have all morning but struggling. Hopefully it wasn't injured and made its way into the water.

Bloody cat.

Gate alarm btw is another weird story.....

Just after Christmas we had a man hammering on our door at 3am. It was all a bit weird and looking at him through the Ring cams it looked a bit like he had a knife. DH was slightly concerned as we have a few rarer cars here and he was worried about answering the door.
Police were called and the area searched, there had been a burglary up the road earlier that night so they were rather fast in responding. It became a bit comical. Man returned several times and Police missed him every time. All very weird.
Eventually established that this is a guy with some mental health issues, and nocturnal door knocking is his thing. He's done it now to a lot of our neighbours. We'd gone back over a few nights of CCTV and he was coming into our garden frequently at all hours. Sometimes just standing there staring, other times running up and down the drive. He's harmless, but annoying, especially as he seems pretty out of it next to a large body of water.

Ended up fitting a sensor to the front gate so we know when he's about and can escort him away. It announces through all the Alexa devices that the gate is open so no missing the guy. Added bonus is this means we don't miss people trying to sneakily return wildlife their cat as taken either....

As for wandering man, we've been leasing with his HA and they have been trying to get him a bit more community support. Not seen him for a few weeks so hopefully he's well and not making nightly visits elsewhere.

How random re man and gate

Hopefully chick is ok

So glad I remembered your user name and checked in on this thread. Lovely to read the updates.