I’m almost sure that there is nothing quite as daunting, as a female duck hatching out a clutch of eggs. I’m sure enough of that fact, that after an incident that occurred many years ago, I am well cured of having any desire to approach a so-called ‘sitting duck’ ever again.
I bought a funny-looking little duck back in nineteen ninety-nine. She was my first hen and I was proud of her. The previous owner explained to me that she was a Muscovey duck. I was so enamored of this new duck and in such a hurry to get her home, that I was only listening with half an ear, so when I introduced her to the family I admitted that I didn’t know what kind of duck she was.
“But her name is Miss Scovey.â€Â
Miss Scovey wasn’t anything like the drakes we had at the time. We had two Pekins; great big heavy white ducks. Where they weren’t white, they were orange. Easy enough. They looked just like any duck I’d ever seen in childhood story books. Miss Scovey, however, had black and white feathers and a red beak, atop which was a series of tiny red knots that extended up almost between her eyes. Compared to the drakes, she was odd looking, but seemed friendly enough.
It was a good three months or so after I brought her home, that I discovered Miss Scovey was missing and went to search for her. I found her in an old milk crate that sat on top of an upturned water barrel back by the shed. Now, my experience with and knowledge of the habits of ducks, male or female, was limited. So when she fluffed her feathers, craned her neck, pasted both beady little eyes on me, opened her big red, knot-infested beak and hissed at me like an angry panther, I don’t mind telling you that my blood ran cold.
“Oh, no you didn’t!†I said.
She hissed again as if to say…
“Oh yes…I did.â€Â
I knew what she was doing. She was protecting a nest. What I didn’t know was how many eggs she was sitting on, and for the life of me I can’t explain why now, but at the time I just had to know how many eggs were under that duck.
So began the battle.
I was bound and determined to satisfy my curiosity and the easiest and least confrontational way I knew to accomplish this mission, was to sit her out. She had to come off of that nest eventually, for food and water. When she did, I planned to be ready. So I sat and I watched, and I walked and I watched, and I watched her watching me watching her (try and say that five times fast) but to no avail. She just would not leave that nest. I thought maybe I could coax her off, by tossing some feed on the ground in front of her.
Nope.
By the second or third day I had reached the end of my rope in the patience department, so I thought maybe I could just slip up behind her and slide my hand under her and count those eggs with my fingers. The trick was to do it in such a way as to prevent another one of those hissing sessions that shook me up so bad. I didn’t know what came after the feather ruffling, neck craning, beady eye pasting and hissing…and I didn’t want to know, because whatever it was, it had to be bad.
So it was with the utmost care and stealth that I crept up behind Miss Scovey as she sat on her nest staring straight ahead and not any wiser at all to the fact that I was slowly but surely closing in on her. Mere inches from my goal I stepped on a twig and her head snapped up; her neck stiff as a ruler and as I watched in horror, her head slowly began to turn until it was literally backwards on top of her neck.
I waited for the feather ruffling and the hissing… steeling myself against it, but surprisingly enough it didn’t come. It was then that I learned that Miss Scovey had an even more frightening and powerful tool at her disposal.
There was a soft sound, like that of a gentle breeze ruffling through the leaves on a tree, and then I was hit with a stream of the most vile, ungodly natural concoction known to mankind. Miss Scovey had used her ultimate defense and it couldn’t have been more effective it if had been acid. She jettisoned duck waste matter onto my person with all the precision of an ace pilot in a B-57 bomber.
Now it was my turn to do some neck craning and hissing. That came first. Then with no regard to the fact that I was outside and it was broad daylight, I streaked (literally) across the yard, abandoning my t-shirt in my wakeâ€â€and headed for the nearest shower.
I think it was about a week before I actually felt clean again, and a little more than that before Miss Scovey stood one day, stretched her wings, and waddled down off her nest, never to return to it. When I found the courage to approach the nest I found a dozen questionable looking eggs of various unhealthy shades of gray and knew immediately that they were all duds, and very likely potential stink bombs to be disposed of dressed in nothing less than full haz-mat gear complete with a gas mask.
Apparently Miss Scovey had realized that she was wasting her time, as the required waiting period had come and gone and nothing had happened. All the excitement over those eggs and the determination to learn how many little ducklings I could expect had all been for nothing. Miss Scovey had had her revenge by sending me on ‘wild goose chase’ and drove home to me the old saying that “one should never count their eggs before they’re hatchedâ€Â. And where it concerned Miss Scovey…double that. With feeling.
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