Pet duck takes on motherhood with 8 chicks

Published 12:01 am Monday, April 17, 2006

CARLSBORG — Picture this: several pairs of chick feet standing on a duck’s webbed foot.

A half-dozen baby chicks, see, are standing under Dolly the duck’s breast, using her flat feet as mats.

It’s an odd sight. But not as odd as how it happened.

A few weeks before Christmas, Angela Jacobsen adopted Dolly, a flightless Rouen duck. Jacobsen’s pet ducks, Peep and Freddy, had been killed by a raccoon.

Jacobsen, 35, taught Dolly to walk on a leash, and the pair became a well-known sight on Sequim trails.

Then, some weeks ago, Dolly disappeared.

When people asked Jacobsen, “Where’s your duck?” she answered, “She’s trying to hatch some baby chicks.”

This is where the story veers into the surreal.