COTTAGE GROVE SENTINEL September 30, 2015
7A
Douglas G. Maddess, DMD
FAMILY AND GENERAL DENTISTRY
Brightening Lives One Smile at a Time
Just Ducky Tips
A Duck’s Tale by
Larry, Moe and
Curly
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“On our wedding anniversary,
we were in the farm and feed
store,” explains Kim, “admir-
ing three cute Pekin ducklings.
Curt spontaneously decided to
buy the babies, Larry, Moe and
Curly (named after The Three
Stooges), so we could provide
our friend’s autistic son, who
can’t eat chicken eggs, with
duck eggs.
We had no clue how to tell
which duckling was female or
male — they look exactly alike
from head to tail...and under.
When the three Stooges began
laying eggs (male ducks don’t)
we fi nally knew their gender;
thwarting Curt’s plans to incu-
bate eggs and raise babies. He
wasn’t going to stop his dream
of having the biggest duck herd
in our neighborhood! That’s
when his next ‘feather brain’
idea formed. ‘Why don’t we get
20 more ducklings,’ he declared.
My disapproval of increasing
our fl ock of three fell off him
like ‘water off a duck’s back’.
When the babies arrived, I
introduced one fl uff ball to the
Stooges, but the ducks would
have none of that! I thought
that since the Stooges were lay-
ing eggs they would look at the
duckling and think, ‘Hey! Look!
We made a baby! Let’s take care
of it!’ — but no. They waddled
away honking, ‘Get that ‘ugly
duckling’ away from us!’
The other 19 itty-bitty fl uff-
ies in unison stopped chirping
at the duck ruckus and looked
in the Stooge’s direction at their
out-of-proportion alarm.
One would think that ‘birds
of a feather, fl ock together,’ but
apparently ducklings and ducks
have a ‘pecking order.’
When our babies escape their
fenced area, the elder ducks
sound the ‘duck alarm’ with a
lot of crazy-loud honking. May-
be the older ducks are worried
Monday, October 5—Thursday, October 8
Open House
Monday–Thursday, October 5–8
7:30 a.m.–6 p.m.
Enjoy coffee and pastries, take
home a gift, and learn about
Emerald PUD and our programs.
Thursday, October 8, 6–8 p.m. at EPUD
FREE carnival games, prizes, entertainment, and
fun for all ages! Get a hot dog meal for only $1,
and all proceeds will go to
Helping Hands, Emerald’s
assistance program for
local families
in need.
Please join us!
Harvest Celebration
Duck duck? Goose goose? Meet Kim and Curt’s fl ock of
fl uffy, puffy yellow Pekin ducks. The couple potentially
created a ‘fowl’ nightmare with their ‘ducky’ wedding an-
niversary gift!
about a deadly small, fl uffy yel-
low fl ock attack?!
They say, ‘If it looks like a
duck, quacks like a duck and
swims like a duck, then it prob-
ably is a duck!’ But, the Stooges
are such ‘bird brains’! They
haven’t fi gured out that the now
two-month old ducklings, which
morphed into white ducks, are
ducks like them, so they keep
their distance.
Ducks play in the water and
it gets everywhere. They are
sloppy but keep themselves
relatively clean. Their water and
food areas are worse than a two-
year-old’s bedroom — with a
mud fl oor!
Pekins are friendly domes-
ticated, egg-laying ducks that
weigh 8-11 pounds. They eat
A LOT — so you can guess the
rest! You don’t want them on
your back porch because they,
ummm, have poor and squishy
bathroom results from their
tasty ‘eat a slug and see what
happens’ menu!
An interesting thing is that the
Stooges rest under our vehicles
and only venture out where
there are other roof-type shel-
ters or when we are close. Their
behavior of ‘duck and cover’
is life saving! Occasionally, a
Stooge tilts her head and looks
up. When I follow her gaze an
eagle or hawk is circling, soar-
ing up high, scoping out our
yard. It’s a puzzle how ducks
can hear predator birds from
such a distance.
Pekins are known to follow
their owners like dogs, and our
loud Stooges make great watch-
dogs, err, watch ducks. One
morning we heard frantic honk-
ing. We ran to the window and
saw a bear cub the size of a very
large dog. Curt loudly clapped
his hands and it ran away. I bet
the Stooges ‘honked’ that ad-
venture up in the barnyard, tell-
ing the other animals that they
should ‘add it our bill’ for secu-
rity help!
The expression to ‘get your
ducks in a row’ is true. It is the
cutest thing watching the young
fl ock when one duckling de-
cides to go someplace and the
rest follow its lead, waddling
in tandem. It makes me want to
break out into a song, ‘Waddle
while you work’.
What ‘quacks us up’ is when
the ducklings do what sounds
like ‘Disney duck laughing’!
We hear one start, then soon
it sounds like they are telling
each other something super
humorous. Then, they all erupt
into Donald Ducks laughing.
We say, ‘I wonder which ‘bird
brain’ is telling funny duck
jokes again!’”
table and spend hours looking
at our bills, worrying how we
would pay them. Dave, on the
other hand, would be sitting on
the fl oor in the TV room, letting
the kids put curlers in his hair.
I would say, “Dave how can
you have fun at a time like
this?” And he would answer,
“Joyce, we’ve prayed about it,
and we’re doing everything we
know to do. I refuse to be miser-
able with you.”
It made me so mad! But Dave
was right. I was allowing my-
self to get upset and waste time
I could have been spending with
my children.
In John 14:27 Jesus says,
“Peace I leave with you; My
[own] peace I now give and be-
queath to you. Not as the world
gives do I give to you. Do not
let your hearts be troubled, nei-
ther let them be afraid. [Stop al-
lowing yourselves to be agitated
and disturbed; and do not permit
yourselves to be fearful and in-
timidated and cowardly and un-
settled.]”
I love this! God is saying, “I
am giving you My peace, but
the choice is up to you!”
Through His death and resur-
rection, Jesus offers us a new
way of living; however, a new
way of thinking will always pre-
cede this new way of living.
Romans 12:2 says, “…Be
transformed (changed) by the
[entire] renewal of your mind
[by its new ideals and its new
attitude], so that you may prove
[for yourselves] what is the
good and acceptable and perfect
will of God….”
This scripture is so important!
choice. We can “rely on our
own insight and understand-
ing”—endlessly thinking about
our problems, trying to fi gure
everything out ourselves. Or
we can choose to adopt a trust-
ing attitude that says, “God, I
don’t know what to do about
this situation, but I can’t fi x it
on my own. If You want me to
do something, I ask You to show
me. Meanwhile, I’m going to
trust You and enjoy my life while
You work on my problems.”
I used to be a professional
worrier—I was good at it. Years
ago, when my children were
young, I would sit at our kitchen
Turning 65 and confused
about Medicare choices?
Board: Ron Davis, Katherine Schacht, Penny Jordan, Kevin Parrish, Lee Kelley
We buy children’s wading
pools which the fl ock all try to
climb into at once - truly ‘taking
to water like ducks’!
Our ducks taught us to read in-
gredients so that our dog’s food
is healthy for dogs not ducks!
We were confused when they
ate the dog’s food because wild
ducks don’t kill cows for beef!
Curious, I looked at the ingre-
dients; the fi rst was what ducks
love -CORN - the rest were
mostly fi llers! What! Where’s
the beef?!
‘Top Worst and Best Dog
Food’ webpage explains why
our ducks discovered the truth!”
http://recipes4gourmetdogs.
com/worst-dog-food-brands/
Do you have an unusual pet?
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it.
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Humane Society for Neuter/
Spay Assistance Program. (541)
942-2789
God has a good, acceptable, and
perfect plan for you and me,
and the way we can experience
it is not to think like the world
thinks, but to be changed by
learning to renew our mind and
think the way God thinks.
So, when life throws you a
curve and you’re tempted to get
stressed-out, I encourage you
to choose positive, faith-fi lled
thoughts from God’s Word. You
can think, The Lord is going to
take care of this. It doesn’t mat-
ter what it looks like—I believe
God is working!
The truth is God knew about
your problem before you ever
got it, and He already has a plan
for your solution. In the mean-
time, you can choose to enjoy
your life while you wait. He has
equipped you with the “mind of
Christ” (see I Corinthians 2:16)
and with His help, you can trust
more and stress less.
Call Paul to
help simplify
the complicated.
541-517-7362
541-746-1583
www.epud.org
Curt, not one ‘to duck his re-
sponsibilities’, used free wood
pallets to build the Stooges’
shelter. He expanded the shel-
ter, for the babies, into a large
laying house and warm-winter
shelter. Also their fenced area
grew larger as they did.
J OYCE
Continued from page 2A
Public Power Week
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Paul Henrichs ~ Independent Agent
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SPOTLIGHT SPECIALS
“The website backyardchick-
ens.com is ‘just ducky’,” said
Kim, “as a resource of other
people’s duck experiences. I
learned to keep the ducklings’
shelter, water and food dishes
clean, often changing them sev-
eral times a day.
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