Gentle Joy Photography: humorous

Showing posts with label humorous. Show all posts

Saturday, July 25, 2020

Ducklings and Their Mama

Ducklings are fun to watch. They are inquisitive... and sometimes are very fast. Ducklings are a lot of work, but they are also so very cute!

Ducklings are soft, fuzzy and so cute!

Mama Duck tends to be a bit grumpy as she watches over her young, but she is a good mom.

Mama Duck took a quick bath while watching her little ones as they waited beside the pool.

The one little guy stayed alert so often, and had already learned to watch for danger.

The ducklings stayed close to mama when they were little.

Frost and her babies.

Ducks in a row!

It's fun to see the babies stay so close to their mama, no matter where she goes.

Frost even looks like she is smiling a little.

The ducklings grow and change so quickly.

The ducklings finally enjoy a swim, but stay close to mom.

Thank you for visiting. I hope you are enjoying the fun little birds and animals God has made.

Links to other posts you may enjoy:

Our Duck Adventure - The Beginning

WHERE Are My Ducks??????

Wednesday, October 3, 2018

Our Duck Adventure-The Beginning

You may have read my post on Gentle Joy Homemaker, about living in the country. It has been a dream of ours for many years and finally it happened! You can read about it here if you are interested:

Living In the Country

Anyway, on to the duck adventure.....

Yes, we have ducks. Six of them, to be exact. Was it a dream of ours to have ducks someday? No.... never.....

So, why would we have ducks?

It started with a trip to the farm store for some forgotten reason. While there, we heard lots of peeps and chirps which led us to investigate and discover baby chicks and ducklings. They were so cute, of course... which is probably why they were close to the cash register area as a temptation. Yes, they were cute, and I thought that was that. My husband said the girls would LOVE to see those. I agreed and we went about our business. Later, another trip was made to the farm store to show the chicks and ducklings to the girls. I thought that was nice... they enjoyed it... but I was firm about saying we didn't need any ducks!

Our sons also had to go to the farm store for something and commented on the cute little ducklings. I agreed that they were cute and life went on. We had lots to do as we hadn't lived in our house in the country for very long and one son was graduating and another son got engaged. Life was busy, but it was so nice to live in the country. I was also very glad my husband had dropped the duckling idea. Whew.

Then a few weeks later, one son came to us saying he wanted to buy 2 ducklings for the youngest sister for her birthday. I resisted ..... as the voice of reason..... too much work, it'll cost too much, what would we do with them as they got older, etc. By this time, son and husband were both very enthusiastic and countered all of my objections.

Now, don't get me wrong. I do NOT make the decisions for our family.... I just let my ideas be known because my husband had asked, "What do you think, Honey?" This went on for a while and excitement over the possible birthday surprise rose. I started feeling like I was holding up the party and figured that maybe I was being too inflexible, so I agreed she would love the ducks and since son and husband said they would take care of details, I hesitantly thought, "Ooookay... "

The day of her birthday was approaching, but ducklings were out of stock. What a disappointment... and a secret relief for me. Whew again!

Then the store had another unexpected duckling shipment arrive, so the surprise was still on. What a hard secret to keep!

Our Ducklings first pool was a small birdbath.

Our life began to revolve around ducks... they needed to be warm enough, but not too warm. They needed to eat... and then we also had to buy grit for them to be able to digest their food.... they liked the water, but couldn't stay in too long since they didn't have the ability to oil their feathers at such a young age, and more.

Our ducklings graduated to swimming in the wheelbarrow. They loved to have dandelions in the water for a snack.

A little pool gave the ducks more room to swim.

We learned, played with ducks, learned some more, cuddled ducks and kept learning.... and cleaning up after ducks. sigh.

Getting dried off and cuddled after swim time.... 2 very sleepy little ducks.

So, that is how we ended up with 2 sweet little ducklings. I know, I know.... there are more than 2 ducks in the first picture in this post and you are right.... we do have more than 2 ducks now. How all of that came about is a story for another time.

The ducklings were fun and a lot of work also.... and our family thoroughly enjoyed them... and yes, I also learned to really like the ducks. All of the family loved to watch them and hold them. Join me again for more pictures and stories of these sweet little ducklings and our adventures with them. I would love to read your comments also... Thanks for visiting me here at Gentle Joy Photography.

Find more posts on family, herbs, gardening, homeschooling, cooking, recipes, life and more by clicking on this link to my other blog:

Gentle Joy Homemaker

Sunday, July 23, 2017

Those Funny and Frustrating Squirrels!

I like taking pictures of the squirrels... but I don't like the damage these silly squirrels do to our house, outdoor furniture, lights, tomatoes, etc.

We only had a couple of squirrels the last few years.... and that was enough. This year, though, the neighbors put up a squirrel feeder and we have LOTS of squirrels.

I think the squirrels in the area have sent out invitations to family and friends from all over and they keep arriving. Sigh.

These squirrels dig in my pots, getting dirt all over. Sometimes they leave the flowers, roots and all, out on the ground to dry out and die. Sometimes they eat the roots.

This year, since there are so many of them, they have gotten quite bold and come often to our deck... and dig in the flower pots. We chase them away, but they come back... and many times they don't go far at all.

You can see the evidence of this guy's digging in my Hibiscus... on the floor and on his face.

I chased him out of the plant and he went down the stairs a bit, then started peeking at me.

Another time one of them was jumping from plant to plant... quite hyper, as squirrels can be.

He seems to feel quite at home...

Like I said, these guys are pretty hyper... moving here and there.... racing from one place to another, making it hard to get pictures, but I still took quite a few.

I was on the back deck and heard noise behind and above me... and here was this guy on the roof. We've seen them on neighbor's houses, but not ours. This wasn't a good thing.

I made noise and he ran over the top of the roof, so I went through the house and out the front door.... only to find 2 of them on the roof out there. They were chasing each other and having fun.

This is a big concern since I have heard that they will try to get inside the attic and I have seen one nosing around different parts of the roof this week. They can chew wires and cause house fires.

My husband and sons plan to check the house and roof to be sure all is sealed up tight and if it isn't, they will fix it. We do need to keep these guys out. They do seem to be getting more aggressive which is a concern.

As I stood watching them, they came CLOSER to me and kept watching me.

As they came to the gutter and kept watching me, it seemed they were warning ME off. Hmmm... whose house is this anyway?!!!

Like I said, we feel a bit over run with squirrels. As you can see, they feel right at home.... and my tomatoes aren't even ripe yet... they love those and take plenty of them.

Not sure how to evict them, but would like to have them find a new home.

I'll still keep taking pictures of them since they are here. They are funny and a bit cute.

I know some of my readers have commented that they don't have squirrels in their country, which surprised me. Do you have squirrels... do you like them or get tired of them? It's a good time of the year to be sure the house is all tight and safe from squirrels and other pests.

If you like squirrels, you may also enjoy these posts:

In the Life of a Squirrel

Baby Squirrel Out of the Nest....

Lessons From... Squirrels?

Birds and Squirrels.......

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Sunday, June 25, 2017

Garden Suspect... In Theft of Blueberries!

We really like blueberries... and have a few bushes in our yard.... The problem is that we are not the only ones who like those blueberries. sigh.

Beautiful blueberry blossoms indicated a good amount of blueberries for this season. We sure looked forward to harvesting them.

They ripen at different times so we check them every day when they are starting to ripen.

Most years, the birds eat so many of them that we don't get many at all. This year, my husband started picking them early... and they were a bit sour, but at least WE were eating them. :)

Even some of the nice looking blue ones were still not sweet, but we enjoyed them anyway.

What fun to see so many blueberries out there this year... and to be able to actually eat many of them.

This week, I found about 5 of these beetles on the bushes and we killed as many of them as we could, but some got away.

This is not a good thing to find Japanese Beetles as they can cause lots of damage. We will be careful to watch for them and kill them as we can. No, we will not be using pesticides, but will try to control them naturally.

We keep checking and enjoying blueberries though, BUT... we have started to find blueberries with part of it gone... and suspected birds.

When I was in the garden taking pictures yesterday, I was startled by this guy flying close to me to fly by the blueberry bush I was near.

Then he landed on the fence.... and acted so innocent. (Notice the dark stuff on his beak... it is evidence!)

Then he quickly took off again... and went back to the fence to sit and look innocent. Then I noticed the blueberry in his beak. I can't believe how fast he could fly through and get a blueberry or a part of one.

It was also strange that I was standing only about 4 feet or so from where he was getting the blueberries, showing he wasn't scared of me being there. I guess those blueberries were just too enticing.

So... when I saw the picture of the blueberry all over his beak, I made a fun picture and sent it to my family members on email. They laughed.

Now, lest you become alarmed that I am truly waging war on birds, rest assured that I do like birds and have written many blog posts showing that. Here are a few of them, if you want to click on the link and see the blog posts:

Cardinals Raise Their Young

Baby Birds and Baby Humans

Busy Bird Bath House

God Feeds the Birds... a Bread Stick?

Like Baby Birds

Birds of the Air

Beautiful Cardinals

These are just some of the posts I have written about birds... backyard birds. There are many others, including about a Blue Heron, Black Swans, Geese... and more. So.... I am NOT a bird hater. Please don't assume that I am.

Sometimes we put netting on the blueberry bushes to protect them... other times, we have used a blow up "eye" that is supposed to scare the birds. We have used an owl statue in the garden... and old CDs or streamers blowing in the wind. They are persistent though... and they like our blueberries... and our blackberries... and the tomatoes and strawberries... and more.

SO.... I am choosing to laugh about it and plan to do better again next year. :) This year is so busy and I am thankful we were able to eat as many of the blueberries as we did... and we will keep checking the bushes each day in case the birds leave any for us!