Donald Duck

Our neighbour is redoing the fence between his garden and our vegetable garden.  This gave us an opportunity to meet his very friendly pet duck for the first time.  Donald is perfectly delightful and a pretty weighty example of the Aylesbury variety.  He posed very nicely for me against a backdrop of marigolds.  He keeps himself shining white as he is fastidious in his cleaning routine.  Donald was abandoned (although I am sure his former owners had the best of intentions) on the village pond to join the wild mallards and the wild geese who habitually swim there.  Unfortunately, his two siblings were taken by the fox and my neighbour, realising the impending fate of Donald, decided to catch him and give him refuge in his garden.  There he joined a menagerie of animals - a ferret, cats and hens.  He is devoted to his new owner and loves to follow him about as he works and he was very interested in his expanded horizons in our very large vegetable garden, happily grubbing his beak in the soil, looking for tasty slugs and such like.  When we have refilled our pond, which is currently undergoing refurbishment, we will let him come in and have the occasional swim.