She called vineyards that had experimented with animals.
She spoke with poultry specialists.
She asked an extension agent what could go wrong.
That was the question Jack respected most.
What can fail?
The list was long.
Too much pressure around young trunks.
Damage if birds were left when fruit became attractive.
Nutrient concentration.
Disease management.
Predation.
Labor.
Fencing.
Water.
Escape.
Hannah wrote everything.
Then made mitigation plans.
She bought ducklings in January.
Jack nearly lost his mind.
“You bought them?”
“Yes.”
“With whose money?”
“Mine.”
“Where are they going?”
“Behind the equipment shed.”
“No.”
“The brooder is already built.”
Jack stared at her.
“You built a duck house behind my equipment shed without telling me?”
“I told you.”
“When?”
“Tuesday.”
“You said you were building a temporary poultry structure.”
“That is a duck house.”
Jack had walked away.
For the next month, he complained every morning.
The ducklings smelled.
They made noise.
They required heating.
Hannah spent money on feed.
Two escaped into the machine shed.
One slept beneath the old forklift until Jack found it.
That duck became known as Forklift.
Jack pretended to hate Forklift.
Hannah caught him feeding it lettuce once.
He denied everything.
By March, Hannah began training the flock to follow the feed bucket.
A whistle meant move.
A double tap against the bucket meant gather.
Temporary fencing created lanes.
The neighbors noticed.
Then the jokes started.
Calvin Moss arrived at Miller Farm Supply one afternoon while Hannah was buying fencing clips.
He saw the poultry feed.
“Still doing the duck thing?”
“Yes.”
“You serious?”
“Yes.”
The clerk, Brian Keller, laughed.
“You’re gonna replace snail pellets with quacking?”
Hannah looked at him.
“Maybe.”
Calvin leaned against the counter.
“You know what we call that where I come from?”
“What?”
“Dinner.”
Brian laughed.
Hannah paid and left.
She sat in her truck for almost five minutes afterward.
Not crying.
Just furious.
The worst part was that she understood why they laughed.
Her plan sounded absurd.
Eighty ducks in a vineyard.
If somebody else had suggested it two years earlier, Hannah might have laughed too.
The only difference was that she had read enough to know it was not absurd everywhere.
Whether it would work on the Miller vineyard remained unknown.
That mattered.
She refused to turn a possibility into faith.
Then April arrived wet.
Snails appeared.
And suddenly the experiment stopped being theoretical.
At 7:42, Hannah made her first serious count.
Marked vine 1.
Fourteen snails the previous night.
Three visible now.
Marked vine 2.
Eleven previous.
Four.
Marked vine 3.
Seventeen previous.
Six.
Not zero.
Improved.
But visible counts were unreliable.
Rain changed activity.
Bird disturbance changed hiding behavior.
Hannah wrote the numbers without celebration.
Jack stood beside her.
“What does that mean?”
“Maybe nothing yet.”
“Half are gone.”
“Some could have moved.”
“The ducks are eating them.”
“Yes.”
“So why maybe nothing?”
“Because if I start proving myself before I have evidence, I’m doing what you accused me of.”
Jack looked at her.
“I accused you of buying too many ducks.”
“You accused me of a lot.”
“Fair.”
He watched the flock.
One runner duck disappeared almost completely beneath the low canopy of a mature vine, tail sticking out.
Jack laughed before he could stop himself.
Hannah looked up.
“You laughed.”
“No.”
“You did.”
“Bird looked stupid.”
“That counts.”
“It does not.”
At eight, the neighboring growers came down from the road.
Calvin entered first.
“What’s the verdict?”
Hannah straightened.
“Too early.”
Calvin looked disappointed.
“You’re supposed to tell us they saved the world.”
“No.”
Tom Riley crouched near a vine.
“You seeing fewer?”
“Yes.”
“By how much?”
“Marked rows are down about sixty percent visible count from last night.”
Calvin whistled.
“Seriously?”
“Visible count.”
Hannah emphasized the words.
“Not total population.”
Tom nodded.
“Could be weather.”
“Yes.”
Calvin looked at her.
“You trying to talk us out of believing your own idea?”
“I’m trying to tell you what I actually know.”
Jack glanced at her.
Again, Walter Miller.
Tom watched the ducks.
“Any vine damage?”
“Nothing obvious.”
“Manure?”
“Some.”
“How much?”
Hannah pointed toward her notebook.
“Tracking distribution.”
Calvin laughed.
“Of course you are.”
Hannah looked at him.
“You’re the one who drove here at seven in the morning to watch ducks.”
Tom covered a grin.
Calvin pointed.
“Fair.”
For the next hour, the jokes faded.
Not because everyone became convinced.
Because the ducks kept working.
They moved steadily through the row bottoms.
Bills searched wet grass.
Snails disappeared.
Slugs too.
Small insects.
The flock remained surprisingly calm as long as Hannah guided its boundaries.
A few ducks wandered.
Forklift escaped twice.
Hannah retrieved it with feed.
At 9:12, Brian Keller from the farm supply store arrived.
Hannah stared at him.
“Seriously?”
He held up both hands.
“I heard there was a show.”
“You have a store.”
“Slow morning.”
“You sold out of half the snail control products.”
“Exactly. Nothing left to sell.”
Jack laughed.
Brian approached the rail.
“How’s it going?”
Hannah said, “Ask me tonight.”
Brian looked at the ducks.
“You know, I was joking before.”
“I know.”
“Didn’t mean anything.”
“I know.”
She did not make him suffer.
She also did not rescue him from embarrassment.
That balance felt good.
By ten, Hannah had moved the flock through six rows.
She returned them to a sheltered paddock for water and rest.
Jack looked almost offended.
“That’s it?”
“For now.”
“They could keep going.”
“They need water.”
“There’s water in puddles.”
“That’s not clean drinking water.”
“They’re ducks.”
Hannah stared.
Jack sighed.
“Fine.”
“They also need rest.”
“Bird union?”
“Exactly.”
Calvin checked his watch.
“You’re putting them back out?”
“After noon if conditions stay safe.”
Tom looked toward the sky.
Storm clouds thickened over the west hills.
Weather models predicted heavier rain by afternoon.
Potential wind gusts.
Hannah did not want ducks caught across an open block during intense wind.
She had designed an early cutoff.
Jack understood when she explained.
“You’re stopping at three?”
“Two-thirty if wind starts earlier.”
“So they won’t finish the lower block.”
“Not today.”
Jack frowned.
“We have snails in the lower block.”
“Yes.”
“What do we do?”
Hannah looked at him.
“Tomorrow.”
Jack almost objected.
Then stopped.
He had spent four months telling her ducks could not solve the problem.