from Chef Anthony
Back in the spring of 2017, Stevenson Ridge took in a little family of ducklings to live on our pond. In the beginning, they wouldn’t leave their “house” across the pond. Over the following months, the staff watched them grow from little ducklings into full-grown ducks. They were then finding their way all over the property, even right up to our kitchen door to see what we were cooking up!
Everyone began to become so attached to …
from Cassandra
The night before the Debicki wedding, we hosted their charming rustic rehearsal dinner on the front porch of one of our favorite cabins, The Log Home.
Their dinner sat about 25 people comfortably, surrounded by wedding day florals and candle-lit lanterns. Overlooking the pond and surrounding cabins, the guests enjoyed a buffet-style dinner accompanied by a self-serve Bellini Bar with an assortment of fruit.
We could not have asked for more perfect weather for their rehearsal night. Even …
from Chris
I scooped out some cracked corn for the ducks this morning, and as I turned around to put the scoop back in the feed bin, look what happened:
Literally, with my back turned, one of the hens laid an egg–right on top of the corn I had just spread for them!
This isn’t the first egg the ducks have laid this year, but it IS the first one they’ve laid while any of us have been around.…
from Chris
A dusting of overnight snow earlier this week revealed a visitor to the pond who might have otherwise remained invisible: a fox.
Foxes are inherently curious, and the trail of footprints clearly illustrated that curiosity. The footprints wove from one object on the ice to another–the fox taking a moment to check out each and every little thing out there. There were pieces of bark from a tree limb that had fallen, chunks of ice we’d chopped out …
from Chris
The cold snap this week has our ducks huddling in a smaller and smaller patch of open water on the pond, which has otherwise started to crust over with a layer of ice.
Their open water is near the Log Home, in the shallow end of the pond. Ducks actually do fine in cold weather so long as they have a little open water, which they need for drinking. As temperatures dip below twenty, their feet can get …
from Chris
…
from Chris
As I’d mentioned last week, I tried my hand this spring at raising some ducks for Stevenson Ridge’s pond. We’ve had a few questions about the ducks since then, so let me take you back in time to Tuesday, May 23, when the ducks first arrived. I received a call from the post office at 4:30 a.m., inviting me to come on down and pick up my ducklings. They arrived in a box smaller than a shoebox.
I …
from Chris
We have a new house at Stevenson Ridge. It sits pondside between the Log Home and the Riddick House. We call it the Duck House—because it houses ten new ducks we’ve bought to the pond.
I decided to try my hand at being a “gentleman farmer” the spring. As an adolescent, I used to raise chickens, and I’ve always wanted to have a few again someday. Well, the time still isn’t right, but I did think a few …