FAIR HAVEN — When Dawn Stover bought 10 duck eggs and an incubator for her daughter last summer, her intention was to teach the kid the usual pet lessons of responsibility and caring.

Instead, Nikki Vuille, 12, is getting a lesson in civics. Not to be confused with civility.

A handful of neighbors have complained to the Fair Haven town council about the ducks, mostly about noise. And this is where the story gets as small town as small town gets.

"I love my neighbors," said Stover, who grew up in the same house she now lives in with her parents and Nikki. "I’ve lived here almost my whole life. Nikki was 2 when we moved back in with my parents, so she’s been here her whole life, too."

But ...

At a public meeting on the issue, some of the complaining neighbors were snickering and mimicking Nikki when she began to cry while defending her ducks.

"My mother was in the audience," Stover said. "She heard it. I don’t want to say anything bad about anybody, but I mean, really?"

Apparently so.

Also apparent is for neighbors who complain about noise, what’s good for the goose isn’t necessarily good for the gander.

"The noise is considerable," said one neighbor at the public meeting. "It’s annoying. When the ducks start quacking then the neighborhood dogs start barking."

But nobody is suggesting a ban on barking dogs, are they?

Another complainant has a yappy Portuguese water dog that barked at every kid riding by on a bicycle, every jogger or walker, the mailman, etc.

Another has a backboard for lacrosse in their yard and the incessant bam-bam-bam as their kid played was every bit as annoying the yapping dog.

The rest of the neighborhood was filled with sounds of the suburbs, not be confused with the sounds of silence. Around the corner, a kid practiced on his skateboard ramp. You know that drill. A whir and a hammer-like WHAP! over and over again.

Another nearby house seems to be the magnet for neighborhood boys, who played four-on-four in driveway basketball but, boys being boys, sounded more like 4,000-on-4,000.

Up the street, the guys from Scanlon’s Lawn Service worked with mowers not quite as loud as unmuffled Harleys and leaf blowers that did their usual two-stroke scream.

Truth is, compared to other noise in the neighborhood, the guttural babbling of ducks is a more pacifying, natural sound, closer to that of the murmuring brook in the ravine in Stover’s backyard.

Every now and then Lucifer lets out a loud "QUAACK!" said Nikki. "Like, maybe twice or three times a day."

The name Lucifer, by the way, doesn’t come from the male duck’s temperament. "She called him Lucy until she found out he was a boy."

Of the 10 eggs Nikki got, eight hatched. She nurtured those fuzzy duckings until the males matured and she had to give two away. Six ducks remain.

The ravine separates the Stovers' property from their three backyard neighbors who complained about the ducks. It is 200 feet of ivy and wooded with ivy-covered oaks and maples. One neighbor has a stand of cedars, dense enough to obscure their house. Another has a solid wood privacy fence.

The ravine is home to a variety of songbirds and squawking crows, and other critters. The Stovers built the pen to keep predators out, rather than keep the ducks in.

"We have raccoons, fox, even coyotes," she said.

A high, ivy-covered fence separates Stover’s property from the neighbor closest to the duck pen, and the constant thumping of the basketball from that yard didn’t seem to ruffle the ducks as Nikki played with them.

"I’m their Mommy," she said as she cuddled one, then another.

A Fair Haven ordinance prohibits keeping non-domesticated animals or farm animals as pets. It also gives the council the power to decide that definition. In prior cases, the council has allowed residents to keep a goat, a llama, and a pony. On Monday, the council heard the neighbor’s objections to Nikki’s ducks, and her defense. Their decision is due in two weeks.

"This is democracy at its most basic level," said Jonathan Peters, the council president and senior member, as he evaluated the duck noise in the Stover’s backyard. "It’s about the balance between individual rights and the rights of the community. We’re going to give it good and fair treatment. It’s important that we not be flippant, because it is a very important to the people involved. I hope we can find a compromise."

This is where democracy comes in.

Nikki made a strong case: her ducks are penned in and don’t run loose, they’re fed in the pen and their droppings are contained to the area. The noise, well, is in the ears of the beholder.

Democracy is one thing. Hypocrisy is another.

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