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PSA #2: Chicks/Ducklings are NOT Easter Toys!

Jen • Thu, Apr 06

On top of the post someone else made regarding rabbits/bunnies, chicks and ducks are also NOT appropriate Easter gifts!

Rescued these two ducklings after a mother purchased them at Tractor Supply for $5 each so her 18-month-old daughter could "experience them", then decided to release them at the duck pond at the veterans' memorial park. She owned them for a whopping 1 hour. They kept trying to follow her as she went to leave. My husband and I just happened to be there playing Pokemon Go with our 6-week-old daughter strapped to me in her K'tan.

My husband is a Veterinarian, I'm a Certified Veterinary Technician. I explained to the woman that these ducklings are essentially newborns and cannot survive on their own at a pond full of territorial adult Peking ducks and Canadian geese. Aside from having no mother to protect them, they don't know how to forage for food yet at barely a week or two old, and have no way to keep warm (it was going to be 38*F that night). They were facing certain death. So I scooped them up and took them with us.

Same as every other year, 'tis the season for all those cute baby Easter bunnies, ducks, and chicks to be sold at every farm supply store and mall across America. Please DO NOT support buying these animals! If you would like to add any of these as lifelong pets to your home/farm, please do so AFTER the Easter season so your purchase is not supporting the sales of these holiday babies. If you would like to surprise your children with a baby chick, duckling, or rabbit kit for Easter, borrow one from a friend with a farm that can be returned to its home that afternoon -- or better yet, take your children to a farm or petting zoo to experience the babies but without the responsibility or damage. It should go without saying that these animals cannot be released into the wild as it is a guaranteed death sentence.

Please remember that these are LIVING, BREATHING ANIMALS and helpless babies, and make the responsible decision not to support their sale for Easter!

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