Country Enterprise: ducks for eggs, meat, feathers, breeding or as ornamental ducks

<H1>Country Enterprise: Keeping ducks for eggs, meat, feathers, breeding, or as ornamental ducks </H1> <P> <A HREF=ducks1.htm>Keeping ducks</A><BR> <A HREF=ducks2.htm >...For Eggs</A><BR> <A HREF=ducks3.htm >...For Meat</A><BR> <A HREF=ducks4.htm >...Housing them</A><BR> <A HREF=ducks5.htm >...Multiplying</A><BR> <A HREF=ducks6.htm >...Breeds</A><BR> <A HREF=ducks7.htm >...Feathers</A></P> <P><A HREF=title.htm >Chapter headings</A></P><P> Duck-keeping is often inspired by pond ownership. </P><P>Any area of water is enhanced by a few ducks floating on it. If this is your motivation for going into duck-keeping, it is worth bearing three important facts in mind. <OL><LI>Duck eggs can transmit dysentery and other illnesses — still water is a great source of tummy bugs. If you intend to eat or sell the eggs, make sure that the pond is continuously being filled and emptied. Or better still keep the ducks off the water.</LI> <LI>If you intend to eat or sell for eating fat ducks, again keep them ff the water. Exercising in water leads to tough ducks.</LI> <LI>Baby ducklings do not always float and mother ducks seem to be unaware of this fact. Again keep them off the pond. In fact, ducks are not nature's most careful mothers and duck eggs are really safest brought off under a broody hen. Of course, she will not have the slightest inclination to take them off for an instant bath. Having said all that against the pond, there are a couple of reasons why you should allow ducks on to it. One reason is that the heavier breeds of duck often find it difficult to mate unless they are on the water. Therefore, when you want your eggs fertilised, let the birds mate on the water, collect the eggs and incubate them artificially or under a broody. The second reason is that ducks really do love water so if all you want to do is improve your view then let them on to it. Ornamental birds can have free access to water if you are breeding them. Mandarin ducks and other ornamental waterfowl sell very well if they are in prime condition and swimming around certainly keeps them sleek and colourful. </LI></OL> </P> <P> Ducks do not lay eggs in nesting-boxes like the obliging chicken.</P><P> In fact, they will drop them anywhere. It is therefore advisable to leave the ducks in their night quarters until well into the morning: that way you have a lot fewer eggs to hunt for.</P><P> Khaki Campbell ducks are the best variety for egg-laying. They are lightweight brown-coloured birds that lay up to 300 eggs a year. A duck does not need artificial light as a hen does and the eggs are larger than a hen's. However, ducks do eat one and a half times as much as a laying hen, about 6 oz of layers mash a day. If you allow the ducks to run on your vegetable garden, you will find that they are great devourers of slugs and unlike the enthusiastic hen, will not enjoy your vegetables as well. Ducks start to lay when they are four or five months old and are always much more expensive to buy than a laying chicken, often up to three times as much. Farmers Weekly and Poultry World carry advertisements of suppliers.</P><P> Duck eggs are something of a specialist market; health shops will often provide an outlet and local agricultural markets often provide custom. People who like duck eggs will often travel to buy them so it is worth persevering to find a market. It is worth pointing out to prospective customers that duck eggs make superlative sponges. Perhaps it is also worth bearing in mind that one of the authors of this book spent a week in an isolation hospital having picked up something evil from a duck egg. We hasten to point out that the egg in question was not one of our own; our policy now is only to eat those we produce ourselves and never to eat one soft-boiled.</P><P> Almost all the ducks we eat are Aylesburys. </P><P>The Aylesbury is the traditional white duck with orange bill and feet. A good Aylesbury will lay up to 100 eggs a year so this breed is sometimes referred to as dual-purpose. However, if you work out the comparative cost of producing an egg from an Aylesbury or a Campbell (three times as much) it is quite obvious that Aylesburys should be bred to fatten. Fed well, an Aylesbury can grow to around 8 Ib live weight in 8 weeks. This is when the birds should be marketed. It is the easiest time to pluck them as they are moulting and not yet in full adult plumage. Ducks are not nearly so easy as chickens to pluck.</P><P> In France the Rouen duck is the most widely eaten. It is a handsome, black and white bird which takes some six months to reach the weight of a two-month Aylesbury. This slower growth is said to give more flavour. The bird is generally killed by smothering. This is said to add to its particularly fine flavour; what it certainly does is make it more likely to 'go off as it has not been bled. It has to be cooked within a very short time of killing to be safe and for this reason it is banned from sale in the USA.</P><P> Ducks remain on the ground so their housing can be quite simple.</P><P> What is important is to have a floor that is easy to clean so that the eggs do not become contaminated. The housing must be fox-proof — the nursery rhymes are all quite true: foxes love ducks and geese. There should be at least 2 to 3 sq. ft of space for each duck and that is assuming that these are only night quarters; if your ducks are also confined during the day, they must have a lot more space. </P><P> It is easier to maintain them in flocks of less than 50. Ducks are timid creatures and should always be treated with care or they will frighten themselves into going off lay or, when they are small, they will stampede into the corners and trample the little ones. We always whistle when approaching ducklings: if they have heard your approach from afar, they seem quite happy. You can use their reaction of darting away in a bunch to move them about. Raise your left arm behind them and they move to the right and vice versa. It is not quite as effective as moving geese in this manner but certainly more effective than moving hens. If you try to move hens like this, you will generally find that they frantically cluck and dart off in several different directions; it is simpler to resort to bribery and lay a trail of grain to wherever you want them to go. (As a last resort it is worth remembering that chickens roost in the dark and if one or more of yours goes missing, creep around shining a torch up into neighbouring trees. This process is extremely amusing to watch but often very satisfactory and much better than letting a runaway fall prey to a four-footed predator.) </P><P>The best way to feed ducks is on a similar ration to hens but in a sloppy mash. They are very wasteful feeders and we always let some chickens in with them to clear up — waste not, want not! If you feed the ducks whole grain, feed it in a shallow trough of water. They like fresh water to drink and if they can get into the water container they will swim in it. If the ducks are allowed to forage they may well obtain enough grit and greenstuff; if they are confined, you have to supply at least the grit. Ducks that are allowed to roam are happy creatures; you will only be as happy if you clip their wings, otherwise someone else will probably get a gift from the skies — your ducks!</P><P> <OL><LI> Run ducks and drakes together: four to five ducks to one drake. If you have a heavier breed, let them run on water.</LI><LI> Collect the fertile eggs.</LI><LI> Hatch them in an incubator or under a broody hen. Of course, you can let nature do her best and allow the duck to sit on them. The number of ducklings reared will almost certainly be far less.</LI><LI> When hatched keep them warm, if not with a duck or hen then with an infra-red lamp and a cardboard surround. Leave them in this for at least two weeks depending on the outside temperature. The infra-red lamp should be gradually raised as the ducklings grow. It is simple to see if the lamp is at the right height: too low and the ducklings rush away as far as they can from the heat, too high and they crowd together underneath the lamp.</LI><LI> Rear growing ducklings on a grower's mash: five times a day at first, three times a day at eight weeks, thereafter twice daily. Feed as much as they will clear up within half an hour.</LI><LI> At around eight weeks, take all the meat birds and dispose of them. Laying birds are grown on until they come into lay at around four months. These you either use for breeding or egg- laying or sell as point of lay.</LI></OL></P><P> Peking ducks are more upright than Aylesburys but similar in colouring. </P><P>The Peking duck is slower-growing but eventually larger than the Aylesbury. It will lay up to 130 eggs a year. </P><P>Whalesbury ducks are a cross between an Aylesbury and a Welsh Harlequin - the Welsh Harlequin is itself a cross between Campbell ducks. It grows well and lays about 200 eggs a year. </P><P>A Muscovy is an odd- looking bird with red wattles. When it is mature, the flesh is very strong-tasting. </P><P>The Nantes duck is smaller than the Rouen duck and is much prized by the French.</P><P> There are all sorts of ornamental ducks such as Mandarins and Carolinas. The best way to sell ornamental birds is through local papers where you can reach other pond-owners.</P><P>Fully feathered ducks will yield up to one-fifth of a pound of feathers per bird. </P><P>If you have a few pounds of feathers to sell, put them in a polythene bag with a few holes punched in, tie a pretty label round the neck of the bag and take them to a local craft shop. Patchwork cushion-makers are often good customers for fine feathers. </P><P>This is assuming that the feathers are clean; if it has been raining for days, you will have to keep the ducks in the dry for a couple of days before you kill them, otherwise the feathers will be muddy and damp. Not only will the feathers be messy, it is also much more difficult to pluck a wet bird. If you have large amounts of feathers it may well be worth advertising for direct sales. As well as craft-users requiring feathers for pillow and duvet fillings, there is a growing interest in making feather flowers. The feathers are often dyed for this and the white feathers from an Aylesbury are ideal. </P><P>Traditionally, the curl at the end of the drake's tail was used as a superfine paint-brush.</P>