Runners away from Home

Some ducks leave the Duck Hilton as fertile eggs - these lucky ducks have been hatched by and live with Alicia in Melbourne.

This is Edith Egg aka Eddy - so named because the egg was laid by the lovely Edith, and it turned out to be a drake, and needed a bit of a name change!!  He is the most fabulous looking black Runner I've seen in a while, and the spitting image of his father Captain.  Alicia says he is always first into the water, and last out.

The Drake in the pool foreground is Harley, Eddy is in there too. Standing Beside is Wiley, Goggleduck and also the little brown duck.  So nice to see them growing up and having such a pampered life.

Roses and Wildlife

This is Warm Wishes, a lovely rose.

And this is Sonia, I love the almost plastic quality of its colour.

We have quite a few skinks in the garden, this is  a fairly large one, and often seen sunning itself. The theory that if you have lizards, then you dont have snakes sits well with me, hope its true!!

Water Garden and borders

Most exciting news from the pond this week - the arrival today of our first water lily bloom - I am ridiculously pleased with this achievement. The recent rain (125+ mm) has made BIG changes to the level in the Lotus pond, but this lily appeared this morning. No Lotus left in this pond after the introduction of ornamental gold fish. The heron has finished off the fish... next season I will buy more Lotus plants, the heron can visit anytime he likes!!

This little native ground cover never stops flowering, wish I could remember its name!

A gorgeous grevilla with deep dark red flowers, the tag has been washed out, so I cant look up its name either!! But love it, bought as tube stock and doing very well.

In the UK I knew these flowers as Amaryllis, but here they are called Hippeastrums, either way they thrive on neglect and as such are PERFECT for my garden.

Not the best day for taking photos, but Moonstone is a gorgeous rose.

Today's theme is lines - plenty of good ones to be found in the garden today

Toad and Loli - not impressed that I left them inside when I went outside to take some photos!!

The weather has been very humid, we are getting some rain too, which is good, but the grass is growing so quickly you can almost hear it!! I've been avoiding mowing it, as you can see - doesnt seem to bother Toad too much ;-D

Loli is not accustomed to ducks that walk towards her when she comes down to the fence, these little guys seem very inquisitive and not put off by having her around... for her part Loli's not entirely pleased with this outcome.

Big day, Loli snuck into the lounge and helped herself to some couch time!! Honestly, butter wouldnt melt her microwave.

A rough old week for the ducklings

Its been ups and downs for some of the ducklings this week. Judas - who I am pretty sure will have to be Judi - fell victim to the same illness that has affected the adults. Looks like it might be pasturella bacteria and it can cause paralysis as well as upper respiratory symptoms. Judas began improving from day 2 of the antibiotics and I thought was on the road to full recovery when he/she took a big step backwards yesterday and was completely unable to stand or walk shortly after these photos were taken. This morning he/she was no better, but by lunch time seemed as good as new. Jesus - who also looks like being a girl - has also started coughing despite being on antibiotics, so we're not out of the woods yet. Jesus is on the left of Ariadne and Judas is the blue duckling back left of the group.



This is Mary, she's doing well - but I am watching them all like a hawk.... which is probably a bit scary for ducklings!!



Saffie was also a victim of the bug, she had wonky legs for 2 days, but seems well now. She is as cute as a button, but once we had to start putting medicine down her throat we discovered she's also a biter!! Luckily none of the other ducks have learnt this trick!! And with a beak this small and all the will in the world, its not like she can do much damage.