Easter Eggs or Ducklings?

In the midst of yet another Nor'Easter, one has to believe that the ducks know best and Spring will not be long in coming.

Caillou, the matriarch of our flock has this year decided to make her nest in one of the chicken egg laying boxes 

which may help contain her eggs, as she has a tendency to scratch her eggs out of the nest.

                                      

Nora, so named because her sister Dora wandered far and wide throughout the woods, until one day her exploring took her to the point of no return.

The incubation period for a Muscovy duck is around 5 weeks, Nora has been sitting for three weeks

Cinco, a daughter of Nora, got her name because she has made her nest under the Pizza oven sink countertop

She has 4 eggs at present and will start sitting when she has a dozen or more, which will probably take another couple of weeks.

The almost identical sister of Cinco, who we named  Mayo, has been sitting for just over a week

and as you can see, has a full clutch of eggs, 17 in total.

Studley, on the left and Sir Francis, are our two drakes.

But don't put away your snow shovel just yet, as Coddle hatched 4 little duckling back in December.

The resilient and not so resilient tree

Amazingly the River Birch, laid low by the weight of snow

has sprung back to its previous shape once the snow was removed.

The Lilac at center survived pretty much unscathed, as did the Dogwood behind and to the right of the old well. It recovered its normal shape, even though the snow covered branches were touching the ground

The Golden willow, back center looks to have come through undamaged, 

but on closer inspection, one of the main stems, left, has bent passed the point of no return. As this is a fast growing willow, I will probably cut out the bent branch and select a couple of well placed shoots from the multitude that will grow from around the cut, to bring it back to shape. 

The Hawthorn fared even worse. I will cut back all the broken branches and see how it grows back. This tree has fearsome thorns, so I may raise the crown above the highest broken branch for ease of grass mowing.

The silver leafed willow also incurred some damage, but once the damaged branches are pruned, it will soon regain its beautiful appearance.

Willows are easy to propagate from cuttings, simply push the clean cut branches in to reliably moist soil, and you will soon have rooted young trees, like these seven willow cuttings that I struck in spring 2017 and will be ready for planting out this spring.