Some people do this before they’re eight years old. Hatch something.

Ducks lay eggs, and I mean constantly, every day, and eventually they want to rest on their white round laurels. They hang around the duckhouse, quack differently, and don’t want to go out in the yard and forage. They also don’t want us to take their eggs.

They feel the clock ticking. Don’t want that awful empty nest syndrome. Get a longing in their feathery breasts when they hear the tweet tweet of little baby robins, up in t...