Reflections on a hot afternoon

Isn't it funny how quickly the British weather can change.  Having suffered deluges of rain for months we've now had hot, dry weather since Saturday, and we've found it is too hot to be out in the garden between 10am and 6pm.  The ducks have adjusted quickly to the new conditions, the 13 are spread out nicely in the dappled shade near their shed as I sit here and write at 10 to 4 ....

... and the young ones are keeping cool in their little pond:

I've been idly wondering about coincidences with numbers of our three hatches.  Billie-Jean hatched out 11, 1 died early on, and the 11th was not accepted.  That left 9, the exact number of ducks and drakes we lost to the dreadful DVE last year.

Following the Duck Virus Enteritis last June we hatched 11 ducklings in the incubator, 1 died early on and that left us 10 - which we would still have if the fox hadn't got Jedda in May.

Our first hatch in 2005, after the foxes had taken all but one duck, produced 11 ducklings.  One died early on while rushing down the steps to the frog pond and it left us 10.

Strange how similar it all is.  I can only hope now that one more number ration will not repeat itself, that between ducks and drakes hatched.  In the previous two cases it was 6 drakes to 4 ducks, giving us all sorts of problems.  Please keep your fingers crossed we don't have the same 6:4 again!