Silly duckies

My front pond is over-grown. Okay, using the term "pond" on this overgrown puddle is being generous. It's more like a shallow depression that I keep filled with water and plants. I digress.

I have some pond plants, and keep a small floating plant in the pond(s). I am pretty sure it is called "duck weed". Any-hoo, the ducks LOVE this plant, and eat it all whenever there is any around. Which means that the only pond that ever has any is in the front yard, where they can't get to.

My front pond is totally coated with the stuff. And I wanted to give the ducks a treat to eat it. But my skimmer is broken. Hubby has fixed it once (screwed new screen onto it), but the frame holding it has broken, so it's pretty much out of commission. And I either forget to buy a new one, or can't find one when I DO remember.

I am resourceful. I am able to "think outside the box". I figured, "Hey, I'll just bring all the ducks into the front yard, put them into the pond, they will snack and then I will take them back into the back yard."

I move the ducks up to the front pond. That right there freaked them out. Any time I separate the ducks, Spicy flips out. She will call and call and call for whoever is missing. I hoped by moving two of them at a time (something I really cannot recommend...beating wings and scratching feet and not having a free hand? Nope) that she wouldn't freak out so badly. No such luck. Still, I got all four of them in the front yard right next to the pond.

And they hid in the flower beds. My flower beds have several bushes, and a flower box over the window, so it's hard to reach into. I tried to push them out with a broom....no such luck with that either. I left them out there for about 15-20 minutes, and they didn't move a bit.

I give up. I don't want to make them miserable, and they obviously aren't going to eat the duckweed, so I may as well move them back to the back yard. Skinny-boy helps me to round them up, and we carry them to the back. All four of them make a bee-line for the pond and chastise me for moving them.

I scrounge up the broken skimmer, and gather some duckweed. Put it into the back pond for them. And look at the quackers! Happy as clams (or ducks!).

Whew. Way too much effort to try to avoid what I ended up doing anyway. I really need to get that new skimmer!