No Duck Dinner For Us

April 8, 2012 · Filed under Uncategorized

SwampMan was supposed to butcher six male ducks. Marauding foxes have snatched female ducks off their nests at night, leaving us with a skewed gender ratio in favor of males. Well, the lovelorn males are killing the ducklings and chasing the females away from their nests, so some have Got to Go in the name of domestic tranquility, namely mine. Besides, I wanted to cook a duck for Easter dinner.

Well, SwampMan has not been enthusiastic at the prospect of Duck for Dinner. He was so unenthusiastic, in fact, that he unilaterally gave the ducks a stay of execution, opened up the detention pen and freed the ducks from death row this morning while I slept.

“What are your plans, exactly, for the ducks?” he asked me when I woke this morning.

“I plan to eat one for dinner. SwampDaughter would like one, too!” I replied.

“Well, how about selling them?” he asked.

“I need the space now. I can’t wait for the next auction.”

“Well, how about taking them back to the wet area and turning them loose? You know, I’d really like to put in a pond just for them.”

For those particular six ducks, or for the ducks in general? “Well, we used to have a pond back in that wet area, and it was full of water moccasins. Remember? It got filled in years ago when the kids were little.”

“Oh, I didn’t mean back there. I meant up here by the house!”

*sigh* “We COULD sneak them into a retention pond somewhere, but that would be ILLEGAL.”

“So you’re saying to turn them loose, right?”

“WHY don’t you want to butcher the ducks?”

“They have sad eyes.”