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It’s fitting that a friend of the late Richard Wood-Samman turned to feathered imagery to describe the bird farmer.

“For lack of a better word, he was an odd duck. Everyone loved him,” said Doug Oscar, Wood-Samman’s friend of 17years.

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Wood-Samman was known as Rick to his friends and “Dirt Willy” to others. He picked up the nickname as a child and it stuck so well that he used it to christen his picturesque farm, Dirt Willy Game Bird Farm and Hatchery, near Ardrossan, just east of Edmonton.

On the federally registered hatchery, Wood-Samman raised wild turkeys, partridges and several types of pheasants.

He was the kind of guy who, in the spring when it was time for hatching, would gently peel away the shells for chicks too weak free themselves, Oscar said.

Wood-Samman died of a heart attack Sept. 27.

Oscar said he thinks maybe it’s for the best, given how hard it would have been for Wood-Samman to survive but to not have the strength to take care for his birds.