a day at the fair

[piranha]

every august, we have the vancouver island exhibition, our local agricultural fair. i haven't gone most years because i missed the dates. this year i seem to be on the ball. i love ag fairs. found a spinner who was helpful enough to correct my drop spindle technique (self-taught), which resulted in instant improvement; i actually managed to spin a very consistent bit without fighting the spindle at all. i learn physical skills so much faster if i can actually watch somebody skilled perform them close up than if i learn from textual description with still images. these guys breed cotswold sheep and angora goats on gabriola island, and i'll visit them soon, i think. she also had the dream spinning wheel for life on the boat: an ashford joy. OMG, perfect.

i took pictures of animals and stuff until i ran out of batteries. first, baby animals. :)

	sleeping piglet *melt*		piglet has a stick this is the last second during which this piglet is in sole possession of said stick. :)
	in hiding "blanc de hotot" rabbits, an endangered breed.		muscovy ducklings this is only half the clutch. can you imagine pushing out 18 eggs?

Comments

[saoba.livejournal.com]

I have a friend in Nashville who owns one of those wheels. It is small and cool and even has its own little case. She once did an SCA version of a sheep-to-shirt project and that wheel got a real workout. She's a spinner, weaver, seamstress, embroiderer, knitter, textlies-in-general talented person, and she thinks the Ashford Joy is one of the most perfect tools ever made.

Plus, something about the look of it just pleases me.

[aquaeri.livejournal.com]

this is only half the clutch. can you imagine pushing out 18 eggs? how did they even fit?

I don't believe they do fit: like chickens, I expect ducks only lay one egg a day. I don't entirely understand the black magic involved that allows the earlier-laid eggs to put off development until the rest of the clutch arrives, so they can all hatch at about the same time.

Oh, the pigeons we sometimes have nesting here also lay one egg every day or so, but they're not aiming for clutches of 18.

[pir-anha.livejournal.com]

oops, there wasn't enough thinking written down in there -- i didn't think there'd actually be 18 eggs in there at once, but i thought that they'd get laid over about a week (because IIRC that's for how long one can safely delay incubating eggs while still getting a decent hatch rate) -- which would be 3 eggs a day, which is still a lot at once. i bet you're right and they just lay one a day. that means duck eggs must last longer before the germ becomes unviable. or ... i didn't ask; it could of course be that they took and incubated some. there is a size difference between some of the ducklings.

the delay mechanism ought to be temperature related, but i have no idea how a duck handles that in the wild. she might just not sit on the eggs much at first. i seem to vaguely recall talk at the neighbouring farms about the occasional hen abandoning her clutch to lay another one. we didn't keep poultry when i was young; my first in-depth exposure was on an egg farm, and they bought chicks to raise into layers, and their layers didn't brood.

i do remember that chicks do not hatch all at once, but closely together, within 2 days at most. so there's probably some rise in temperature that makes them all kick into hatching overdrive -- maybe developing chicks in the egg add to the temperature of the clutch under the brooding hen?

i shall have to ask some expert 4Her tomorrow. :)

[aquaeri.livejournal.com]

I'm also beginning to think that 18 suggests some artificial help. 9 is about the largest flock of ducklings I've seen in the wild, and 5-6 is very typical (which is about a week, taking some losses into account).

I agree temperature is likely to be an important factor in controlling the whole process.

[porcinea.livejournal.com]

PEEEEEEEEEEEEEGS!!!!

only obliquely related

[aquaeri.livejournal.com]

I don't think you're subscribed to botany picture of the day; today's picture made me I think of you:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/73254522@N00/217056076/in/pool-botanypotd/