Muddy gumboots and lots of fun

Wow! Today was a great day.

Today we visited the farm of a very kind lady I "met" on one of the forums I like to visit. She has a number of goats (most are Angora goats) and the cutest little goat kids. Here the human kids are meeting a goat kid, this little one's name is Bubbles.

This one came over to say hello.


And then we went to see the ducks. They are kept in an enclosed area so that the hawks, rats and pukeko birds don't attack the little ducklings.


Bianca was in her element to have a chance to hold this tiny little duckling:


This lady also has chickens and she was hoping that the one hen (who was particularly vocal at that point) was busy laying an egg, but no such luck. However when Bianca wasn't looking she hid an egg in one of the nesting boxes (or whatever you call it) and let Bianca discover an egg in the nest.

She has a great variety of birds in her aviaries and she breeds them and then sells them. There was even one that could talk a little bit and when she says something like "dog says?" then the bird says "woof, woof".

Inside her house she had some baby birds that she is busy hand rearing and that I presume will be sold (well one was sold as we were there). They stay in their cages for part of the day, but she also lets them out to spread their wings. They are so friendly and pretty soon flew onto our arms and my head. I thought Bianca might feel a bit frightened, but she really enjoyed the experience.


The blue one in the photo above took an interest in our water glasses and he decided to have a bath in the one glass and then suddenly realised that it wasn't such a good idea. So the lady helped him out pretty quickly. And needless to say we didn't drink water from that glass again :-).

Then she had one last surprise for Bianca. She had this small box next to her and when she opened it we heard the funniest noise, almost like a fan or something, turns out they are tiny little baby birds who recently left the nest, but that she is feeding 4 times a day (a special porridge-type food) and they were making this funny buzzing kind of noise. Bianca took a liking in this little one. It didn't even have feathers yet, but when it grows up will be just like the yellow one above.

He felt quite warm and he kept going towards Bianca and snuggling up against her arm that was against the table. At one point it looked like it was yawning a bit, so it was time for him (or her) to go back into the little box with its friends.

And then it was time to go home. Afterwards Bianca asked "when can we get a farm?" and "when can I get a baby bird?" I had to explain to her that when you buy a baby bird it doesn't look like the tiny little one she held in her hands as that one is too small to live on its own. And then later on Caitlyn said "I walk in mud".

I simply can't wait until we are able to have our very own lifestyle block.