Tag: domestic

April 21st – Spent some downtime doing mechanical things on the bikes and then went for a test spin up to Chasewater. On the way, I noted that Mrs. Miuscovy, who escaped her domestic flock over 12 months previously, was still thriving on the canal despite her singular and peculiar habit of rarely moving from the towpath and adjacent patch of canal.

She’s a fascinating and resilient bird, and considering her fellow escapee was fox lunch soon after escape, the Newtown One’s survival is remarkable and to be commended.

A daring and delightfully eccentric duck.

August 4th – The bachelor boys – the mongrel domestic/mallard ducks that live on the canal in Walsall Wood –  are sadly down to two now from the original four. Probably lost to age or a fox, it’s always sad to see such close groups decrease in number, and their loss was in the summer, coincidentally at the same time as the local fox cubs would have been learning to hunt.

I spotted the two remaining ducks on the canal by the overflow at Clayhanger Bridge, loafing and preening. The two were relaxed and content in each other’s company and for all the world were like an old married couple.

It’s hard not to love the ducks, although mother nature seems to consider them very expendable.

March 19th – A late ride out to Chasewater, feeling a bit low. Cheered, however, to see the Newtown One, the Papillon of Brownhills, was still evading the attentions of both her mistress and Brer Fox. 

Go home, Mrs. Muscovy… there’s free food, other ducks and a warm roost in safety. And the drakes who chased you off are now in the freezer!

February 21st – Today, I saw an old familiar, I thought was lost – the white domestic goose from Chasewater with the bump it’s head. Originally part of a cohort of six kept as guards for the boatyard at Ogley Junction, they were cast into the wild when the yard closed. Living on the canal by the Chemical for a few years, two were lost, presumably to the local fox’s belly. When the Chemical was redeveloped, the geese moved to the main lake at Chasewater, where they lived seemingly contentedly amongst the Canada geese and swans.

One bird was lost to the cold in 2013, and another disappeared last year; for a couple of months now I’ve only seen the one, and assumed this bird was lost, but today I saw it preening by the waterspouts club.

The flock would be probably over ten years old now, and it shows in their eyes – these are venerable birds. Truculent, permanently cross and hostile to anything that didn’t give them food, they were hard to like. But I’ve always loved them. Such pure, white plumage, always tidy birds who knew their mind.

I hope they see another summer, and feel the warm sun on their backs once more.

May 8th – On the canal at Walsall Wood in steady rain, an interesting group of mallard crossbreed ducks, which I think are fed and loosely tended by a household near the water. I notice there’s mallard in there, of  course, but also white ducks and the one with the grey/blue bill suggests a ruddy duck is somewhere in that one’s genes.

That’s the thing about ducks, they’ll freely interbreed…