Kids and Critters

I came home from running errands with Dad yesterday and Glady was sitting on the front step waiting for me. As soon as I put the truck into park she came running over shrieking “Mama, mama, come and see something!”

As fun as it is to see my almost teenager getting that excited, I followed her up and into the rabbitry. Sure enough, we finally have baby bunnies. We’d bred the does on April 9th, so having kits on May 14th makes me go hmm… I didn’t put a hand into the mass of fur mommy rabbit had made for them, but I could see movement. I’ll count bunnies when they get a little older. Best not to upset a doe this early into the litter, especially not a first time breeder. Of the four does we had bred that day, it seems she’s the only one that took. We’d lost one of our experienced bucks over the winter, and the new bucks don’t have a clue. I’m not sure how to teach that to a rabbit!

The kids have only recently been allowed to hold the baby ducks and chicks. Although as you can see, the ducks aren’t so little anymore! The four Pekins have astounded all of us with their rate of growth. The one remaining Khaki Campbell is pretty big, just not by comparison to them. He is doing ok, although he will always be lame from the ring that was around his leg when he was shipped to us, and which dug into his leg before I clipped it off. He is the only survivor of the ten ducklings we’d ordered. The others were either dead in their box, or within 24 hours of arrival. I will never order from Murray McMurray Hatchery again, not just because they shipped the ducks separately and stressed them, but because they never responded to my e-mails and voicemails at all. Next year I think I will find an incubator and we’ll raise our own chicks and ducklings.

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