My son has always had an extreme aversion to the word ‘poo’ – not to the actual substance, or even to the act of ‘pooing’ (in fact he used to brag about what he called his ‘whoppers’ (sorry, hamburger-lovers!) when he was little and sometimes compared them to works of art, much to the horror of his friends. So ‘poo’ is not in his vocabulary; he much prefers more abrasive words like ‘sh**’ so I have to be careful to use the correct word when I ask him to clean up the duck droppings from outside the back door which Tapper (above) and his mates seem to think is their toilet area.
I had heard that ducks did it more than other poultry but I wasn’t prepared for the amounts. At first I thought it was fantastic that the ducks came to the back door quacking for me to come out and give them lettuce, but it was a bit alarming to find that they were giving me much, much more in return. And they do it rather noisily too – I call it squelchily. Sometimes the squelch noise is louder than the quack noise. It’s a little off-putting for visitors to have to tread carefully through what has become a maze of duckpoo.
I did consider nappies but that’s another story.
The Indian runner duck below is about to ‘do it’ – to poo (sorry, Son!)
jmgoyder 