I've Got to Admit it's Getting Better

The waterfowl seem to be getting along a little better lately.  Like all animals, there's a hierarchy to their living together--a caste system.  Chickens have one that most people are really familiar with -pecking order.  But waterfowl have one too, and it can be a bit more complicated to maneuver.  Unlike chickens, who can forget that there are any new "people" in the coop with them after a day's rest, Geese and ducks have long memories.  They don't forget from day to day, and so the hierarchy "discussions" can be long. 

Here we've had a good amount of time to acclimate the old geese with the new geese, and the new ducks with everyone.  For weeks, the old geese terrified the ducks.  Then one day, everyone was accepted.  The new geese/old geese relationship is trickier.  As the old geese recognize the new geese as their own kind, they are more reluctant to let them fit in.  It seems we may be ironing it out a bit now, though.  I think it has more to do with the new geese's size than anything else.  They are becoming a force to be reckoned with.  Either way, it seems that it's getting better.

Of course, none of that applies to interlopers.  A pair of mallards came flying out of the sky this morning and landed in the pond. 

They were pretty, and I was hoping they would stay awhile, but the girls were less than hospitable, and they shortly flew off. 

 Oh well.