Duck loaves and chicken piles
This weekend has been a mostly relaxing one for the flock. The sun is shining, the pools are cleaned and the treats are plentiful.
Petunia shows her advanced technique for being a duck loaf. She has had a lot of practice, but she’s also a natural.
She and O’Malley are good friends, but she has moved out because Ramona is not very nice to her when she’s nesting.
“Why can’t you just be nice!”
O’Malley has tried to talk to Ramona, but it just goes in one ear and out the other.
He even tried singing, but the Ramona monster’s resolve is strong.
So O’Malley gave up and decided to just be a duck loaf like Petunia.
Chickens are a little bit different. When they lay around, they flop over in a pile instead of staying in a nicely baked sun loaf. Here are Cindy Buttons, Janet, Carol and Olivia showing how to make sun piles while also mashing plants. Very advanced technique.
Olly Astro is good at sun piles too, but she just wasn’t in the mood today.
Once all the loaves and piles were done, the special kids came out for swim time. Lester, Danny girl, Miles and Lucky ate some peas and took turns swimming in the tree trunk pool.
“Blurgle gurgle ha ha ha.”
Here Lucky shows how to talk with your beak full of water.
Then they both tried to reach the peas that I put in the pool.
Miles and Lucky both love Danny girl completely, but they are a little much to take all at once, so they wait until she is done swimming before they’re allowed in the pool.
“Please hurry I love you!”
Once I pluck Danny girl from the pool, all insanity and goofiness begins! Miles and Lucky LOVE to splash up a major storm. See why this is a bit too much for Danny?
Lucky will dive and flap.
And Miles will try to push him out so he can have the pool all to himself.
Then it’s time for some preening in the sun.
“Gotta keep the feathers lookin’ good for my lady.”
Once all the other kids had their turns, we put them away and let little Lionel Ernest come out and take a swim.
He is still a bit skittish, but he is improving slowly and has even started quacking at me.
He’s really good at splashing, and even found a few peas left at the bottom of the pool.
Then he flapped off the water and went back to his pen to rest and recuperate some more.
Simon prefers to watch, but only from a safe distance.
Lastly today, we had an unexpected call from a friend about an injured crow. Our friend Rachel said the crow was dragging one wing and hopped into a patch of grass. She kept an eye on the crow and I came over to help catch it. Unfortunately, the crow was really easy to pick up, which could mean she’s very injured. But we caught her and I took her to PAWS where they’ll be able to help rehabilitate her if she can recover.
Just another wacky weekend with the duck loaves and cluck piles… and a crow.
Here’s hoping for a great week ahead.
– Tiff & the flock
Janet and Carol, a friendship
Janet and Carol were sitting in the sun together this afternoon.
Janet reached over to preen Carol with her beak.
And Carol returned the favor by preening Janet’s cheek.
Janet and Carol came to us at different times, under different circumstances. But as you can see, they love each other’s friendship now, and are great companions to each other.
Janet was surrendered to a veterinarian after she had a prolapse and egg-laying issues and her owners didn’t want to pay for it. Carol was found wandering the streets of Seattle and taken to the Seattle Animal Shelter.
Ramona photo bomb!
Chickens are extremely social and emotional, and enjoy the company and care of good friends. Almost as much as they love sunshine.
Janet and Carol are a great example of the importance of good friends.
Quacks and clucks,
Tiff and the flock
INCOMING: Lionel the little buff duck
This little buff duck came to us this evening from PAWS, a great wildlife rescue organization in Lynnwood, WA. His name is Lionel. He was dumped at a place called Country Village and he has a foot injury. He isn’t a wild duck, so PAWS couldn’t rehabilitate him for re-release to the wild. He doesn’t belong in the wild because he’s a domestic duck. So he came to us.
Lionel is unfortunately very skittish and really scared, but he is safe and warm and will get some veterinary care for his foot injury tomorrow morning.
I always hate to see new little ducks come in who are so scared and sad, but I am hopeful that Lionel will feel better and make friends with our other gimpy ducks once he has some medication.
For now he is kept separate from our other ducks until the vet clears him as healthy and free from parasites. I was going to keep him in the house, but he is so skittish and afraid of people I decided to keep him near the other ducks. So Lionel is set up in an enclosed soft crate in a pen with Petunia, Olivia and Cindy Buttons. I wanted to put him near Lucky and Miles since he speaks the same language, but ducks are like little dinosaurs when newbies arrive, and Lucky went ballistic over the new guy. Lionel doesn’t have the energy to deal with aggressive, cranky ducks, so he’ll stay in a peaceful pen for now until he feels better.
In other news, Danny girl’s test results came back and she is completely free of lead and infection. In December when she arrived, her blood lead count was .36 and a normal reading is .02-.04. She was very near death. Now her lead count is back down to .02 and her blood count also shows no infection. I wanted to be sure because she still stumbles pretty badly. But this is as good as she will get for now, which is just fine. She can get around good enough to feed herself and swim, and she is enjoying her life, so we are happy with her progress and glad to know that this is her new “normal.”
Lionel goes to the vet in the morning and as soon as we know more we’ll post an update here or on the Facebook page.
Thanks and quacks,
Tiff and the flock
Danny girl and her boys
Danny girl is doing okay, but not as good as she was doing a few months ago. She had another round of chelation medication to make sure she didn’t have any metal left in her system, but that didn’t seem to help.
So today we took her into the vet to have blood work done again. If you recall, Danny came to us from PAWS just before Christmas very near death. She had a bad infection and serious metal poisoning from swallowing a large piece of metal. She was really very near death, and I wasn’t sure she’d make it.
But she has been holding her own, and hopefully we can help her improve just a bit more so she can get around better. Her boys sure love her.
She rooms with Lester, who is also handicapped. But these two here, Miles and Lucky, quack at her every move and love to watch her all day long.
Danny girl is easy to adore, and Lester, Miles and Lucky are all smitten. We’ll keep you posted on her health, but she’s stable for now thankfully.
In other news, the scovies are doing well. Petunia is rooming with two chickens right now though, because the Ramona monster isn’t very nice to her. They all spend the day together, but at night Petunia snoozes with Cindy Buttons and Olivia hens.
Carol has been sneaky lately. We couldn’t figure out where she was hiding eggs, but as you can see, we finally found the spot. She’ll get to keep them there for a little while, and then we’ll steal them and feed the eggshells back to the hens so they have enough calcium to make more eggs in the future.
Here’s a photo of Felix the gosling from his rescue last weekend. The people who helped rescue Felix sent it to me, and the couple on the left were the ones who noticed Felix was all alone for too many hours. Hopefully he is doing well and growing up big and strong at PAWS with other gosling friends.
Today O’Malley and I hung out together in the yard for a while. He loves to snuggle and tuck his beak under anything he can.
It doesn’t seem like the easiest way to breathe, but as you can see, when he sits like this his beak sticks out the other side.
Simon hung out in the yard today with us as well. He loves to sit and listen to all the little birds that play in the trees. He even shared my lap with Cindy Buttons today, much to her irritation.
Both Cindy and Simon are used to having to having my lap all to themselves. But they are learning to share.
Lastly, once Danny returned from the vet and her boys were sure she was safe, they had a fun time in the pool and enjoyed the day.
Happy weekend from ducks and clucks.
The Gosling Fairy Came!
This morning we woke up to an email from the Seattle Parks department saying park goers reported a baby gosling left unattended in the nest for over 15-hours. The nest is on top of that cement round block. People had seen the gosling alone in the evening and returned in the morning to see him alone again, with no other goslings and no parent geese around. This time of year it’s really easy to inadvertently goose-nap a perfectly fine gosling, but this sounded like a genuine case of an orphaned gosling, so we went to check it out.
High five, little dude! When we got to the park, the gosling was wet and cold, so we snatched him up and snuggled him close to dry him off and warm him up. The parks people had waders, so they had retrieved the gosling from the cement block already. It’s possible his nest was just abandoned or he hatched late and was left behind… it’s hard to tell since the nest is out in the middle of the water.
Here you can see the baby gosling is already trying to preen his feathers and dry himself off, but then he gets sleepy and has to rest. We drove the baby to PAWS in Lynnwood, WA where he’ll be rehabilitated and re-released back to the wild if he does well. He seemed pretty strong and peepy to me, so hopefully he can gain strength and grow up strong.
I named the little baby Felix after our good goose friend who passed away in the Netherlands recently, part of our friend Peter’s flock. Felix was a strong, proud gander, and it is a perfect name to pass on to a new baby Canada gosling. I gave this little guy a pep talk before turning him over to PAWS, telling him I was very sorry he wouldn’t be raised by his goose parents, but that he will be safe and have friends and food and love until he is big-enough to take on the world by himself.
I went back to the park to call to the nest and see if I could hear any more peeping, but all the peeps I heard were from these little mallard ducklings.
I left these ducklings with their mom and dad and left the goose nest alone, hoping there were no more hatching orphans in the nest. I may go back one last time tonight to see if there’s any sign of parents, but at least Felix will have a good chance at growing up to be a wild Canada goose.
If you would like to donate to the care of Felix the baby Canada gosling, you can donate directly to PAWS here: https://www.gifttool.com/donations/Donate?ID=1938&AID=670
He’s a lucky little goose.
Quacks and clucks (and honks),
Tiff
P.S. This is the exact pond where Monroe and Cowboy were rescued.
Strike a pose there’s nothing to it. Vogue.
Olly strikes a pose at the vet’s office today. We’re really glad we decided to take her sneezing seriously and take her to the vet, because she has some serious issues going on.
Olly has had her share of issues in the past. She was surrendered to the vet when her owners didn’t want to pay for her medical care. She had such a serious respiratory infection that it took 8 weeks and several medications for her to fight her way back to health. She has always been prone to respiratory infections because of that, and she’s had a few over the years.
Unfortunately she also has fluid on her abdomen, which could be a recurrence of her other health issues: internal egg laying. She had her oviduct removed over a year ago and over 20 yolks removed from her abdomen. But she still has her ovary, so it’s possible she is laying internally again. The vet took some cultures and slides and we should know more in a week. Meanwhile she’s on antibiotics to help, and as you can see, she is back in the yard noshing on bugs and grass.
Olly just seemed to have a little sneeze, so I’m really glad I listened to my instinct and took her in to see the vet. Sometimes a minor issue can be serious with pets, so it’s best to be sure and have them checked out. Michelle, one of our favorite vet techs, carried Olly around the office with her. And we also saw a goose, cockatoo, parrot, cockatiel, iguana and some canaries.
Back on the home front, Lester and Danny girl took a swim while Miles and Lucky looked on.
And sweet Simon took a nap in my arms while we sat on the lawn with the ducks and clucks.
Sometimes he would hear a birdy and wake up for a minute.
He’d look around and follow them through the trees.
And then he’d drift off, back to dreamland.
Here’s hoping you’re having a peaceful weekend like Simon.
Quacks and clucks,
Tiff
A quick flight and some other birds
We left our flock for a few days this past weekend to visit some family and friends in Utah.
I got to visit and play with my best friend Tricia and her cute kids.
Here are two of them hamming it up for me. Aren’t they adorable?
I got to eat out at some great vegan restaurants in Salt Lake City and my dad even tried vegan food!
Dad: “Don’t you remember when I was vegetarian and hanging out at the Himalayan Institute and making my own sprouts and yogurt?”
Me: “So you’re saying it’s genetic?”
Dad: “No. I’m saying it’s a phase.”
Me: “Ha ha ha.”
I was stalked by my mom’s crazy closet cat.
Snuggled with her dog, Roscoe and met my best friend’s new dog Bella.
Played with my baby sister Fiona at my parents’ house.
And even visited some really cool birds at Tracy Aviary in Salt Lake City, UT. This one’s an emu.
This guy with the fancy eyelashes is a Southern Ground Hornbill.
And this one, well they let me hold this one.
He’s an Aplomado Falcon. And he was very cool.
But now we’re home sweet home. The flock is doing fine, and even furball Simon is well.
And we found this wonderful card from all of our friends at PETA waiting for us in the mailbox. They sent this card of condolences on the loss of our super roo, Toro. PETA crowned Toro their 2012 Champion Chicken and I know they are as sorry as we are to see him go.
I know Toro was very special to a lot of people, and I want to thank each and every person who sent condolences or posted notes online about this special guy. He really was a wonderful, fluffy little round roo and his big personality left a big hole in our hearts now that he’s gone. But it was all worth it, just to know him.
Thank you, everyone, for the well wishes.
P.S. A NOTE ABOUT AVIARIES: I was just driving by the aviary and decided to check it out. I normally do not frequent any place that makes money off of animals in any way. But I have an aviary myself for rescues and know others who have aviaries, so I was interested in how the place was built. The aviaries are really nice, but in many cases too small. I felt there were too many flamingos for the size of their area, and the Southern Ground Hornbills seemed to have some pacing/stress behaviors. The place looked nice, but in some cases it didn’t feel nice. This is unfortunately very often the case with zoos, aquariums and other “educational” animal businesses.
Rest in Peace, Toro roo
Today we said goodbye to our giant roosterball, Toro roo. Here he is as a little baby when he first arrived with his turkey friend.
This is a short video of both Toro and Persephone on the day they first arrived.
I guess they are about 2-3 weeks old, which means they were born around June 10, 2011. Persephone Kerfuffle, Toro’s turkey friend, already passed away after her legs gave out from poor breeding and malnutrition or birth defects. But Toro hung on for quite a long time, in spite of his challenges.
Toro was a sweet little guy who didn’t seem to be in very good shape when he arrived. Both he and Persephone were rescued from a cruelty situation which resulted in cruelty charges against the person who had them before they came to us. They were filthy and starving.
In spite of being different species, Toro roo and his turkey girl Persephone were inseparable. They spoke different languages but still understood each other perfectly.
As they grew, Toro improved and it was Persephone who wouldn’t be with us for very long. She had a deformed leg that unfortunately gave out on her as she grew heavier.
Once that happened, she was not happy being unable to move well, and we had to say goodbye.
Toro continued to grow and improve, though he has always had trouble walking and breathing, because he is bred to be so uncomfortably large.
Once his favorite girl was gone, I spent more time with Toro roo and he became a good companion.
Each day he would sit with me and stretch his legs while we talked about his day.
He has never been able to walk much because of his size, but he was comfortable for a long time.
For a few months, he did walk a few steps each morning, but would quickly tire out and need some rest. Here’s his morning hen chasing routine.
In February, Toro gained National fame when he was named PETA’s 2012 “Chicken of the Year” for his great work just being an awesome spokeschicken and showing people that he is not food, but a living, feeling, wonderful roo.
I like to think he was proud of his accomplishment, and we hung his certificate over his pen where he could see it every day.
Toro had to sleep nights in the house because he would crow in the morning. But in the past few months, his breathing had gotten more shallow, and his crow became quiet, so he was able to move outside full-time and share a night pen with Cindy Buttons and Olivia hens. He really enjoyed that time.
You can see in this video from February or March that he could still take a few steps, but he couldn’t really walk anymore. He still had a lot of joy and life in him though, and he was a great conversationalist.
In the past few weeks, one of his back toes became very swollen and infected. We treated it with antibiotics and gave him some pain medication, but it wasn’t really improving. We could have switched antibiotics and tried another one, but none of them would really improve his quality of life long-term.
So this past week I started talking to Toro about whether or not he was ready to join his turkey girl, Persephone Kerfuffle.
He had started to sleep a lot more, and started breathing through his mouth more, which wasn’t a great sign. So today we said goodbye.
I’m always sad to lose a friend, but in Toro’s case I feel a lot of relief. He was so, so heavy that I wanted to really make sure I didn’t wait too long and make him suffer needlessly.
He had a very good, comfortable life here, in spite of being bred for meat and born into a cruelty situation.
He was a super roo-chicken among chickens. A sweet, sweet boy with a big heart and a lot of love for his family.
He was da best rooster ball there ever was.
Rest in peace, my lovable little chubby cheeks. Give our best to that sweet turkey girl, and many, many thanks for everything you taught us along your chubby little rooster way.
“Think occasionally of the suffering of which you spare yourself the sight.” – Albert Schweitzer
Learn more about the broiler chicken industry, which supplies over 95% of all chicken consumed in the United States.
Special thanks to the Bird & Exotic Clinic of Seattle for letting me hold and stay with Toro as long as I could, until he was zonked out. I appreciate your care and compassion so much.
Toro to the Vet
Toro roo went to the vet on Tuesday to have his swollen toe examined, and also to have a quality of life evaluation. Because Toro is a broiler or meat bird, he was bred to be extremely overweight and grow very fast. He has always had trouble walking, and broilers don’t normally live very long lives, so I wanted the vet to give an objective opinion on my plan for Toro.
Thankfully, she agreed that Toro is good for now. We will treat his swollen toe and get that feeling better, and he’ll be able to live a while longer, as long as he can get up and move around comfortably to reach food and water, and as long as his keel and belly are not sore from sitting so much.
He really is a happy giant rooster ball, and I love having him around. I was even able to move him back outside because his crow is very quiet and he rarely crows at all.
In other news, long-time followers of my blog might remember years ago when I had my nephew “the teenager” living with me for a year.
Fast forward to six years later and he’s all grown up! Ethan graduated from high school and completed 4 years in the US Marine Corp. Now he is in college in Southern Idaho and doing pretty well. That haircut he is sporting is a post-Marines special. He was in Seattle this week on spring break and spent the time cleaning my house! How awesome is that?
That’s it for tonight. Toro the round rooster ball is sleepy. We’ll keep you posted on his toe and his handsomeness.
G’nite.
Looking Back: A Year without Flapper
We are fast approaching the 1-year anniversary of the peaceful passing of my sweet baby boy, Mr Flapper Duck. I cannot believe it has been a whole year without him, but what a year it has been.
Each day I am thankful for the many, many ways in which Flapper changed my life for the better. If I had never met my awesome little fluffy guy, I would have missed out on the amazing reconnection I’ve made to nature, and the wonderful world I’ve discovered since being “inside the flock.” This conversation with George the goose is just one example.
I know most people will never understand or appreciate how cool it is to be trusted by a bird or flock and invited into their world. Most people assume that just because they don’t understand the complexity of flock life, that birds must just be dumb or simple. But every time I listen to someone drone on about their cell phone bill or complain about traffic, I can’t help but wonder who the dumb one really is.
Birds are at least as emotional as dogs and cats, if not more. Because of the complexity of their flock structure, they need strong social skills to keep their position in the pecking order. And they’re great conversationalists.
If not for Flapper, I would never have had the opportunity to know and love a baby turkey. Persephone Kerfuffle was such an amazing little life, and I’m grateful every day to have known her for her short time on Earth. What a great kid she was.
This year also brought other new birds our way. Little Mickey the rescued pigeon only spent a few days with us, but we learned how to properly feed and care for him by listening carefully and asking for help from our network of bird friends. I often hear my fellow animal activists say they are “giving a voice to the voiceless” when they work for animal rights. But to me, animals are speaking loud and clear, we’ve just forgotten how to listen. Having Flapper in my life awakened me to all the conversations that go on every day that are too often drowned out by the hustle and bustle of suburban city life. I’ll never forget how Mickey looked at me with confusion until I figured out how to properly feed him. He was communicating so clearly, and because of my experience with Flapper and other birds over the years, I was finally able to listen and learn. I couldn’t help but figure it out because I had to get him to stop looking at me with a confused expression!
After a year, I can honestly say that my experience and friendship with Flapper was unique. He trusted me so much and was so comfortable around me that it really was special. While every other bird has the same capacity and complexity as Flapper had, none have been as open and completely at ease as he was with me. O’Malley comes pretty close, and I love the big dinosaur, but Flapper was just at ease and at peace whenever I was around. It was truly a privilege to know him and I will be forever grateful for how that fluffy little guy had me turn left in life and appreciate the beauty all around me.
Even today, I still get notes and emails about Flapper, which surprises me. I know how special he was to me, but I’m still caught off guard when someone else connects with him through his blog or YouTube videos. Here’s a note we received yesterday from a couple in Greece:
“We are a couple who adores ducks …maybe more than usual.
Since 10 days or more, we discovered this flapper material on YouTube and we got crazy with this guy!
Every day we both played some of your flapper videos.
He became our mascot.
We’re sooooooo sad that we just heard he is no longer in life.
We felt like this little guy was our own.
Best wishes to you.
Keep upload your duck in videos.
Remember flapper.
He was our best!”
That note made my day. It’s been nearly a year without Flapper now, but it has been a very special year and I wouldn’t change it for the world.
Quacks and clucks,
Tiff and the flock
