The dark colored duckling is the injured one.
The Davis Farm, home of the special needs duckling. I thought I’d post that as a status update last night. Then I thought… that’s not duck-first language. I should have said home of the duckling with special needs. Because, words matter, you know, and it is a duckling first. If you’ve never been witness to the wars on appropriate disability language, then you don’t know why I was giggling or even what I’m talking about. That’s ok.
Pre-injury ducklings
3 1/2 weeks ago, we bought three adorable Muscovy ducklings. We bought them to be pets and have thoroughly enjoyed getting to know ducks and their behavior. Oh my… they are so…. duckish! Not chicken-ey at all. Sadly, our neighbor cat, an excellent mouser, noticed the sitting ducks (and they do. sit. They sit all the time, unlike chickens) and crawled through the open chicken coop door and made off with a fat duck for lunch. I found the other two that afternoon, one scratched and stressed, the other almost unable to move and very weak/limp… but without significant visible injury.
Fast forward a week and we have a healthy duckling and a duckling with cerebral palsy. He gets stronger every day (which is why we haven’t dispatched it yet), but is unable to stand. One side is stronger than the other, so he is always flipping himself onto his back, where he gets stuck. I put him in the water to clean off the poo build up and the poor fella swims lopsided and needs helped out after just a few minutes.
So that’s us. The house of the lopsided duckling. We’ll be going to get a few more healthy ducklings soon… not sure what the future holds for our little crooked duck. Oh dear.
Oh dear is right!!!!