Mouth to Beak

The weather has been glorious, and surprisingly I have been up since 5.30am.I had strimmed the field borders, walked the dogs and made a good start at weeding the veg patch by 10.30. I met up with Hazel for lunch,collected all the poultry food for when we are on holiday then got home to meet up with Geoff, who is very kindly sorting out the field in the evenings when we are away.
As we were chatting Geoff pointed out that one of the ducks was flapping madly by the fencing, and when I got there It was clear that the poor animal had wound one of the nylon strands around its neck. Even though I freed her in seconds the poor little female had literally garroted herself and looked beyond help. Clearly she wasn't breathing, so with Geoff looking slightly aghast, I gave the poor little thing a good chest slap then opened her beak and blew hard.
Now I have done CPR plenty of times at work but I can honestly say I have never performed it on a duck before. Unfortunately, unlike ER we didn't have a happy ending this time and the poor caramel female died.
It was a sad accident and unfortunate as I had raised all the 20 ducklings without a single casualty. With the dog attack deaths in the hen run recently as well as the old Black hooker dying of heart failure, things have looked rather glum over all. Let's hope it will be the last death in a while.


Organising cover for the animals has been more complicated than organising the Christmas off duty on the spinal Injury Unit. Carole will be taking Maddie and George while William and Meg are off to the kennels. Steve will be sorting the poultry out in the mornings and Geoff will be doing the evening jobs. Ned will be coming in to check on the prospective new buff chicks in the incubator ( they are due Sunday/Monday) and will transfer them (hopefully) into the heat lamp nursery in the shed.
The evening sunset today was lovely, and I was still outside cutting the lawn when Chris got back from South Wales at 6.45pm.