Our first Muscovy ducks hatched starting yesterday. Unfortunately our guineas killed one while I was gone, but I was able to stop them killing a second one. Promptly moved mom and the nest into a secure area. There are now four baby ducks and four eggs still in the nest.
I can't stand this much cuteness all in one place! Aaaaah! :-)
Well what can one say!!!...They are just to cute. Why are all babies so cute? Shakin head, it's beyond me.
I agree...soooo cute. congrats!
Today they were toddling all over the place inside their secure pen. The three that hatched yesterday were especially active. One just hatched this morning so it was not quite as active but it was trying to keep up. But they found the chick waterer right away and later found the gamebird starter. The evil guinea gang was patrolling at one point outside the pen trying to figure out how to get in but they can't! I put an ad on craigslist to sell the guineas, cheap. They've never been my favorites and their latest actions didn't exactly do anything to help their case. If I can't sell them soon, they'll go to freezer camp.
But back to the ducklings. I don't know why baby animals are so cute, but they sure are. Their little beaks are no wider than my pinky fingernail. And their little tiny webbed feet.... aaaaah, cute overload!
Being irresistibly cute has survival value. My Mucsovy ducklings are now at the awkward ugly stage: not enough down to cover their now larger bodies and sparse new feathers poking out here and there. But it's okay, they've already won me over.
It's called neotony. We are genetically programmed to like things that are babylike - big eyes, short faces, rolypoly. If you think about it, all baby animals look like babies, the same kinds of features. It is what keeps us from just walking away and leaving the baby when all it does is scream bloody murder. It is what makes us attach to and care for a creature as helpless as an infant. Very interesting.
And I agree - those duckies are too cute for words!
