Mr Flapper Duck

This is a great example of a typical day around here at Flapper’s house. This is pretty much how this whole year has been.

Monday morning I get up a little late for work per usual. I go out to care for the ducks and find that Petunia does not want to come out of her pen. I pick her up and turn her over and find that she seems to have a stuck egg and a slight prolapse and she seems to be in pain.

Not good.

So I tell her I’m going to go call the vet and I set her down in the big, clean pond which I just refilled the night before.

I call the vet’s office and find out that all avian vets are out of town at their big yearly conference. Some avian vet in Des Moines is still in town. I do not know where Des Moines is. They ask if I want his number and I say I’ll call back. I’m actually thinking to myself “If he’s not at the conference, he probably sucks.”*

I go outside to see Petunia has laid a soft-shelled egg in the pond, but there are a few weird strands of red with it, and I swear they are moving.

NOT GOOD!

I call the vet’s office back and say Petunia passed the egg, but I swear I see some kind of parasite or worm or something moving. I confuse them with questions and they suggest I bring in a fecal sample to test. I go back out to see that both Chewy and Flapper are swimming in the pond with the egg and creepy crawlies. Awesome! Now if it’s a parasite, everyone has it! (Oh well, they probably already all had it anyway.)

I put Petunia in a pet carrier on a fresh towel and tell her to poop on the towel while I get ready for work. I go inside and shower and get ready for work and come back outside to see if Petunia has a fecal sample for me to take to the vet.

I let her out of the carrier to find that she has decided not to poop on the towel. Great. I call the vet back and tell them it might be tomorrow when I bring in the fecal sample because Petunia is not coopera… hold on. She just pooped.

I’m on my way.

Drop off Petunia poop at the vet’s office. Go to work. Very, very busy at work. Had to cancel trip this weekend to Utah for my 20-year high school reunion because work/pets/school are all far too busy. Call the vet’s office and ask them to ask the vet about a specific antibiotic for GI-tract issues when they talk to her at the conference she is at. They tolerate me but think I am koo koo. I’m fine with that.

Get a call at the end of the day that the fecal tests are both negative, and that what I probably saw was just a bit of blood. And I probably just imagined it was moving because it was in the water.

Hmmm.

I have a vivid imagination, but I doubt I imagined red moving things. I make an appointment for Petunia to see the vet this Saturday, once avian vets are back in town.

Petunia seems fine today. I checked her vent and it looks okay. But I know I didn’t imagine the red moving things. There were probably 4-6 of them. They’re still in that pond. Cannot drain the pond Monday evening because I have a graduate school paper due on public-private partnerships. Awesome!

Go to work Tuesday. Funny client does not like sound effect we used on website. Says it sounds like “a magical wet poop.” It’s poop week! Come home from work Tuesday evening and start draining the 120-gallon pond to search for 4-6 tiny red things in the bottom with the mud and pond sludge.

By the time the pond is empty it is dark. The ducks are in bed for the night. I am kneeling by the pond with a flashlight, scooping the bit of sludge off the bottom of the pond to see if I can find 4-6 tiny moving things. I scoop sludge onto a paper plate with a smaller paper plate. All the while I wonder “where did I turn left in life when I should have turned right? What decisions led me down the path that resulted in me kneeling in mud with a flashlight covered in pond sludge looking for a parasite or worm in the dark? How did what came out of my duck’s butt become the biggest focus of my week? What does that say about me and my progression as a human being?”

I clean the pond and leave it empty to dry overnight. Then I take my paper plate of pond sludge into the house to look for the tiny red thing.

Eureka! And, EWW!

In the 120-gallon pond I somehow manage to find this tiny thing. I do not know what it is, but it is still moving! I only find this one. The others have probably bored holes into my brain by now.

See? See it moving? Know what that means? I didn’t imagine it!

After watching this thing move and getting a clear picture of it, I compare it to photos on the Internet and decide it is midge larvae, also known as a bloodworm.

It’s not a parasite.

It’s fine. It’s the larvae form of a gnat or midge fly and it’s common. It’s a very popular fly fishing lure in fact. I name it “Madge the Midge” and put it in a syringe full of water to take to the vet to confirm that it is indeed a midge larvae/bloodworm at the lab.

So… It’s normal. That’s good.

Except… what is this thing doing in the oviduct of Petunia? Why are there no midge larvae in her feces but in her oviduct with a soft-shelled egg?

I cannot find any information anywhere on the Internet about midge larvae in waterfowl oviducts. Really weird stuff. Doesn’t belong there. Should not be there.

Petunia will see the vet on Saturday. She’s fine until then. She has been to the vet three times in the past year. She has had a weird vent issue before as well. Hopefully we can figure out what is so weird about her and those midge larvae.

And there you have it! That is the story of Petunia and the Very Typical Day.

I could use a few days of absolutely nothing going on. Boredom is my new goal in life.

*That’s just what I was thinking. Not necessarily accurate.

UPDATE: Possible smart theory from smarty person. “I feed Wafflez blood worms. I am wondering if maybe they were in the water and they all came up to eat the egg?” Could that be possible that they did not come from Petunia at all but were just in the pond? I had just cleaned the pond the night before so there wasn’t much in there for them to eat. Maybe they were freshly laid midge larvae that night? Interesting theory, smarty person.