Fall Visitors

The fence around our chicken/duck/goose yard encompasses our small pond which the ducks and geese use regularly. Each fall we play host to about 20-25 wild Mallards from the end of September to freeze-up. They make themselves at home on the pond and come right up to the poultry houses and feeders and seem pretty darn comfortable co-mingling with our domestic birds. About two times a day, they fly up into our front yard to clean up dropped sunflower seeds under the bird feeders. This was morning snack time yesterday.

Sorry the quality of the picture isn't better; I was too far away and they were fast-moving gobbling machines.

Here are a bunch of the Mallards and a couple of chickens in the poultry yard munching on pumpkins and Swiss chard. (This, too, is a poor picture. It was taken from upstairs today through window and screen.)

"Mmmm, frozen pumpkin and frosty Swiss chard!”

And, of course, the ever-nosy geese always have to see what's going on.

Yes, those are snow flurries you see in a couple of the pictures. We woke this morning to a very light dusting of snow (emphasis on light) but at least we've seen some now. Temp has made it only up to 30° at mid-afternoon, so maybe we'll see more snow yet.