But Wait There's More

Another Sheep gave birth.  This sheep is named Madchen, and she is about the same age as SCC.  She delivered one male lamb, during the night.  The birth was heralded by many humming mosquitoes.









Madchen has turned out the be a very good mother.  This is the same sheep that Christopher and I purchased from Shipyard as a 40 pound lamb.  She knocked me down then.  She has been a good sheep ever since, but when I went to pick up the lamb, she made a strange noise.  I remembered how she knocked me down when she was little, so I set the little lamb down and backed away slowly.  She is a good mother. A bit defensive though.  We have named Madchens baby male Safmo.  Safmo stands for Sell at four months old.




Speaking of defensive mothers, you may remember "The Duckess".  The duckess had become a highly agressive bird when she began to sit on eggs to hatch them.  She had attacked chickens, the other ducks, the dog Enki, and in general was very hateful towards everyone with the possible exception of me.  Everyday at least once a day, I would pick her up and put her outside her cage to eat, flap her wings and in general keep her condition good.





On October 5, a full day early, I was surprised to see that Duckess had a small fluffy black head sticking out from her feathers.

Duck eggs take five weeks to hatch.  We only had a few duck eggs under her, so two weeks into the hatch we added some chicken eggs.  These are supposed to take 3 weeks.  But our chickens seem to hatch in 20 days instead of 21.







The next day, the duck eggs hatched.  Once hatched, the duck would take the shells and fling them out of the nest.  One she ate, but mostly she seemed to want to keep a tidy, ant free nest.  I have not seen chickens do this.  Here you can see two of the black chicks and at least one of the yellow ducks.

 I had no idea that baby ducks hatched out of the shell already died an attractive bright yellow color.

Two stern little penguin colored  chickens look on as their momma duck shows them what happens to bad eggs.

Few things are cuter than a newly hatched duckling.  They seem to radiate a sense of happiness and well being.  Just the sight of a bright yellow fluffy duckling seems to suggest everything is going to be ok.

This seems cross cultural.  Upon seeing the ducklings, a local friend of mine said, "Oh, it makes me happy to see them when they are young like that."

The full hatch, five ducklings and two birchen chickens.  There was a third chicken, but he died.  I don't know why.  This was the sixth of October, and duckess still liked me.  Within a few days she would become hyper protective.  She now hisses at me and strikes at my hand.