She Who Must Be Obeyed (S.W.M.B.O.) is a soft touch for unfortunates. And unfortunates can fall into a lot of different categories - I am not one of them! Usually ugly dogs out of the pound can catch her eye; certain little children with grubby faces can too. But over the last three years a couple of ducks have done the job.
They are Mallards and every spring and summer they fly over our fences and land close to the house, often announcing their arrival with a couple of loud quacks. This will cause the lady of the house to rush outside and grab a handful of bird seed and throw it over the inner fence to them. They gobble it up at once.
The two boys are rather annoyed at this diversion of Madam's attention when it should all be focused on them. If they can make it out there they will rush the inner fence and try to scare the two birds. But the Mallards have learned over the years that they are quite safe behind the barrier and barely give the Poodles a glance. I checked up on potential ages of Mallards and it seem they can live up to 15 years. It's proving to be quite a commitment.
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