Life in the Raw : Ken Gibbs

Working for UNICEF not only benefits children (we trust), but also sometimes benefits the community we join when we finally retire, as may be seen in the following piece.

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The phone rang, and I was told that the wild ducklings had escaped to No 1.

Perhaps I should explain. A friend up the lane has a fish pond in her garden and, to this pond had come a pair of wild mallard (ducks) who proceeded to do their thing whereupon the female disappeared into the undergrowth and the drake remained on guard in the pool. Such are the roles of expectant parents.

In due time we saw the duck with a lot of little fluff balls, swimming in the pond, and we thought, “How pretty they look !”

Move on a week or so when the phone rang to tell us that the ducklings had mysteriously appeared across the road where the builders were working in a property which has no pond. As this had happened a year or two before, I immediately went for a large blue plastic bucket and proceeded to No 1, Porthilly. The reason for the large blue bucket was that I had learned from years of working for UNICEF that the water collectors – usually women or children – found that a 10 litre bucket was generally the optimum size to transport water to the home. If this be the case, then it should be ideal for transporting escaped ducklings as they couldn’t jump out.

On arrival at No 1, we managed to corner the ducklings and scoop them into the bucket. Mother duck stood by, protesting, loudly. I was determined to get them back to the pond where they would be relatively safe, but this entailed crossing the road again.

So here we had this procession with me with bucket full of fluffballs squeaking for their mother, with mother waddling close behind me, protesting that I was trying to kidnap her babies. . . . .and two builders holding up the traffic in the lane so we could cross safely. On arrival at the pond, mother duck threw herself into the water, still protesting vigorously, while I gently lowered the bucket so the ducklings could find their way towards mother duck, in the water. What a racket !

Happiness is. . . . . .a family together again.

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Notice that the drake was nowhere to be seen. Off down the pub, perhaps ?

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