superintend the establishments of others, and as the following
experience will be entirely my own, I shall hereafter use the personal
"I". It is needless to say that the figures arrived at from the
calculations made of those ducks were startling. What! can I grow ducks
in three months as cheaply as I can grow pork in a year, or beef in two
years, and then get six times as much per pound for it after it is
grown? Yes, if figures tell the truth. Can I afford longer to grow large
crops of fruit and vegetables, working early and late, risking frosts
and drouths, making a bare livelihood, when with one-tenth part of the
labor and capital involved I can grow a crop which drouths and frosts do
not injure, and make five times as much? No! I have not had a hog on my
farm since I kept a Kemp's spreader to work over the manure, and simply
grow fruit and vegetables enough for feathered thieves and home
consumption. Another question arose: "What shall I do with my cows?"
some sixteen or eighteen in number, bull, young stock, etc.
My Farm.
Now, I had become somewhat proud of my farm, as what man does not who
had quadrupled its increase within ten years? I was cutting yearly some
two hundred tons of hay on less than half that number of acres, and I
knew that if I sold my cows I should, in some way, be obliged to get rid
of my hay and that would mean disaster to the farm. There might be no
decrease in acres, but there would be a sad diminution in the tons of
hay. The result is, I keep cows for my own use. Have built two new
barns, each one hundred feet long, the basements of which are utilized
for box stalls, accommodating sixty boarding horses. These convert my
hay and grain (for which I receive the market price) into manure. This
is all I expect and all I get.
A while ago a gentleman from New York caught me hoeing in my onion
patch. He expressed his astonishment at the size of the onions. (I now
grow two or three hundred bushels yearly to supply my own and neighbors'
wants, and just to keep my hand in.) Said he: "Your land seems well
adapted to this crop." "Yes, I have some twenty or thirty acres that are
level, the soil is easily worked and friable, not troubled much with
maggot, and, if properly handled, is about sure of a crop." "Why don't
you put it all into onions?" "I cannot afford to." "Why," said he, "if
our New York farmers had that land within twenty or thirty miles of New
York city it would be worth $1,000 an acre, and they would make it pay
twenty-five per cent. of that, too, every year." "Possibly they could,
but with one-tenth of the labor and capital employed I can raise ducks
enough on one acre to buy all the onions I can raise on ten. If I am
going to increase my capital and labor in any direction I should put it
into ducks, not onions." He acknowledged that perhaps I was right, but
at the same time thought it was poor economy to grow nothing but hay on
such land as that.
The Muscovy Duck.
The Muscovy duck as its name implies is a denizen of the Mediterranean
and is a beautiful bird, quiet and inoffensive in its habits, but cannot
compare with the Pekin either in fecundity or in market value. It cannot
be induced to lay so early in the season as the Pekin, thus forfeiting
the high Spring prices. The eggs require about the same time to incubate
as the goose egg (five weeks) and they do not hatch well in an
incubator. It is some three weeks longer in maturing than the Pekin and
does not command as high a price in the market by two cents per pound. I
asked a prominent Boston market man yesterday the reason for it. He said
that the flesh was coarser than that of the Pekin while the disparity in
the size of the sexes made them very unpopular, for instance, while the
drake will dress from eight to ten pounds the duck will rate but four or
five pounds. Said he, "I want none of them." There are two varieties of
this bird, white and colored.
The Indian Runner Duck.
This bird is of recent introduction, and while it can never be a
first-class market bird on account of its small size and dark pins, it
has many good points. Its fecundity is wonderful. There is, perhaps, no
bird that will excel it as an egg producer for market. Its patrons are
enthusiastic in its praise and claim an average yield of one hundred and
seventy-five to two hundred eggs per year from each of their birds, but
their small size, four to four and a half pounds, together with their
dark pins, militates against their value as a market bird. I have always
emphasized the point that size as well as fecundity is a necessary
adjunct to a profitable market bird. It is no more trouble or risk to
grow a large bird than a small one, while the market returns are often
double. The large bird will always command at least two or three cents
per pound more than a small one, as well as a more ready sale. The
Runner is a parti-colored bird.
I was very much pleased with the Pekin ducks. They not only layed some
weeks earlier than any other breed I had ever kept, but were precocious,
maturing earlier than either of the other breeds, excepting the Cayugas,
there being but little difference between the latter and the Pekins, but
the Pekins laying some weeks sooner, it gave us control of the early
spring markets, which are by far the most profitable of the year.
Disinfecting.
My neighbors had become much interested in the business and often
visited me, and were not backward in giving their opinions. They
predicted failure for me, giving as reasons that the market would soon
be glutted with so much of that kind of stuff, for poultry never could
be as good grown in that unnatural way, and that if I kept on growing
those ducks in the same yard, year after year, the land would eventually
get poisoned, and then disease would clean me out.
But I had thought this thing all over before laying out my yards. I knew
that reversing land and cropping it would disinfect it, so a crop of
ducks is always followed by a crop of something else; and thus I succeed
each season in getting two crops of ducks and two crops of either rye,
barley, or oats, so that the land has not been poisoned, and is still
growing its complement of large, fat ducks every year, and as I have set
it to plum trees, it is beginning to yield fine, luscious plums. Neither
is the market glutted, as the demand is far in excess of the supply. The
way of growing does not seem to be any objection, as the marketmen are
willing to pay me, at least, two to four cents per pound more than they
can possibly get for those grown in the natural way.
Perhaps a word here would not be amiss regarding the merits of
artificially and naturally-grown poultry for fancy and market purposes.
This is a vital question, and it is as well for the public to fully
understand this thing now, as well as its origin. There is many a person
who has been thoroughly convinced of the great advantages and the
economy of the artificial over the natural way of doing it, and who
would gladly have started in the business, but was deterred by the
prevailing opinion that artificially-grown birds were always deficient
in plumage, and could never win at a show, and that the flesh was
inferior for table use and could not find a ready sale. It is as well to
explode this thing now, and expose its utter fallacy. There is not a
shadow of doubt but that much poor poultry has been put upon the market
by people who have attempted its culture in the artificial way by
growing hundreds of ducks and chicks in the same limited space that they
formerly used for a dozen with an old hen.
These, of course, could not be otherwise than poor and the mortality
great. Another reason: the fancy business in poultry is fast being
overdone. The best breeds are now scattered far and wide over the entire
country. There is not the demand for them that there has been, because
good birds can be obtained nearer home. Many of our old and well-known
fanciers are making frantic but vain efforts to keep their business up
to its former standard. They have suffered considerably from competition
with artificially-grown birds, and they roundly assert that it is an
unnatural method, that the conditions are not right, that it affects the
growth and plumage of the bird in such a manner as to preclude its ever
taking a first-class premium at our shows.
Now if they can convince the public that naturally grown birds can
capture premiums, and they grow all their birds in the natural way, it
is easy to see how their trade would be increased.
Now, I never could see how the old hen could impart vigor to her chicks
by imparting lice, or how the increased contributions of filth from the
old hen, united to that from the chicks, could ever make the conditions
more favorable than that from the chicks alone. It can no longer be
denied that the artificially-grown fowls are fast coming to the
front,--a place which they already occupy in the market. Knapp Bros.,
Fabius, N. Y., the greatest prize winners on White Leghorns in the
country, grow their birds artificially. We could mention many others who
are doing equally well. Our own Pekin ducks have, for many generations,
been hatched and grown artificially, and today, for size, symmetry, and
beauty of plumage they stand unrivaled in North America. They have won
first from Canada to the Gulf, and have never been defeated. Three times
during the past ten years we have been obliged to enlarge market boxes
to accommodate the increased size of our birds; and yet we have bred
only from our own stock. A number of times I have procured winning birds
at the Pennsylvania and Western State Fairs, with a view to a change of
blood, only to cast the birds aside on their arrival here, as I could
not breed from them without deteriorating my flock in size. If this is
the result of artificial growing and of in-breeding, I shall keep right
on.
In-Breeding.
I have always selected the very choicest and best from the many I raised
for breeding stock, and the result has been a gradual increase of size.
I have seen many persons who, from a mistaken idea of introducing new
blood, have reduced both the size and quality of their stock. Let it be
here understood that a man who keeps but one drake and a few ducks is
breeding-in fast. But the one who keeps a thousand in different yards
can breed many years with impunity, because the intermingling of blood
is exactly in inverse ratio to the numbers kept. I have repeatedly
heard prominent marketmen in New York and Boston say that my
artificially-grown poultry, both in chicks and ducks, were the best that
they ever handled.... I will endeavor to secure their signatures to that
effect, as convincing proof of this, as I wish the public to know the
truth as it is.
I was then breeding Pekins exclusively, and found the business while
growing them was far more profitable than ever before, and accordingly
increased my incubating and brooding capacity, and instead of growing
1,500 to 2,000 ducklings, grew from 10,000 to 20,000. This was done
during the early spring and summer, the machines and brooders being used
for early chicks during the winter. I had observed that, during my
experience with chicks, that crossing with the best breeds always made
better layers and better market birds than either of the breeds from
which they originated; also, that the first cross was always the best,
and that continued breeding from crosses is sure to deteriorate both in
size and quality.
Crossing.
I conceived the idea of procuring some of the best stock possible of
Rouens, Aylesburys, Cayugas, and crossing them on the Pekins, with the
object of increasing the size and precocity. I experimented first with
Cayugas, and crossed both ways, using both Pekin and Cayuga drakes, and,
in order to test the experiment fairly, the mongrel eggs were hatched in
the same machine, the young birds grown in the same yards, subjected to
the same care and feed, with the Pekins. The Cayuga cross was very
satisfactory, with two exceptions. They were fine, plump birds, took on
fat readily, and matured as early as the Pekins, while the mortality was
not more than one per cent. on either, but we found that the skin was
dark, the dark pins, when there were any, showing very plainly beneath.
These birds were sent to market in the same boxes with the Pekins. Our
dealers to whom we shipped allowed us the same price for them as for the
Pekins, as there were but few of them, but had they all been of that
color would have been obliged to cut them two cents per pound on the
price. This was enough for me, especially as I found that the feathers
commanded but little more than half the price of the pure white feathers
of the Pekins.
The experiment, though conducted in the same manner, with the Rouens,
was somewhat different in result. There was a great loss from those
mongrels. They evidently inherited the same weak constitutions of the
Rouens. They had not the vitality of the Pekins, while they required at
least three weeks longer to mature. This latter alone was sufficient to
condemn them for all market purposes, especially when subjected to the
same discount on dark pins and feathers as the Cayugas. This was
sufficient to discard both breeds for my use as market birds.
Aylesburys.
But I expected great things from the Aylesburys. I procured the best
ducks to be had in the country, while I used imported drakes from the
best prize-winners in England, and I have never yet seen those drakes
equaled in size; and I was unusually careful in this experiment, because
I knew that the English breeders claimed for their birds a superiority
in all the points essential for a good market bird, namely, delicacy and
flavor of flesh, size, precocity, and greater egg production,--laying
special stress on their hardiness and vitality. I bred those birds clear
and crossed them, carefully noting the result. Our first batch of Pekins
and those crosses numbered about 300, nearly equally divided. These were
mixed and confined in two yards. For the first two weeks there was no
perceptible difference, when gradually the young Pekins began to outgrow
the crosses, the difference increasing with age. The former were very
even in size, the latter irregular, while the mortality was as six to
one in favor of the Pekins. When we began to kill those birds the Pekins
were all in the market at the end of eleven weeks, while the crosses
remained in the yards fully one week behind. The weight was in favor of
the Pekins about one pound per pair.
The same difficulty existed as in former years--the tenacity of the
feathers. The pickers grumbled, while the birds were more or less
disfigured. I notified the dealers of the breeds of those ducks, and of
the claim made by the English breeders, and wished them to ascertain if
possible if there was any difference in favor of the Aylesburys. They
said their customers found no preference, for themselves they preferred
the Pekins on account of the larger size and finer appearance of the
dressed birds. But I found it made a vast deal more difference than that
to me. One pound per pair on 2,000 pairs of ducklings, at an average
price of twenty-five cents per pound, made a difference of more than
$500 to me; especially the extra ten days required to mature the
Aylesburys cost more than the feed for extra pound of flesh grown upon
the Pekins. I do not keep Aylesburys now, and have not since that
experiment; I never shall again.
Precocity.
There is one point which I wish to impress, which is too often
overlooked, and yet is of the most vital importance to the poultry
grower, and that is the early maturity of his market birds. I often hear
growers say that as there is very little change in the poultry market
during nine months of the year, and as they do not contend for the early
spring prices anyway, if their birds are three or four weeks longer in
maturing it does not matter. Does is not? I have always contended that
it requires just so much to sustain life in either bird or animal, and
the profit consists in what we can get them to consume and digest over
and above that; and if the time required to do this is protracted longer
than is necessary, it is done at the expense of the grower.
If it takes ten weeks to grow five pounds of flesh on one bird and
fourteen weeks on another the one must necessarily cost more than the
other per pound, simply because you have to sustain life four weeks
longer in one case than in the other, and that cannot be done for
nothing. That is why, though I can easily grow a pound of duck for six
cents, I must have eight cents to grow a pound of chicken, because the
ducks will take on six pounds of flesh in ten weeks, while the chicken
requires twenty weeks to obtain the same size. These appear trivial
matters when a person grows only a few dozen fowls yearly, but when he
makes a life business of it and grows fowls by the thousands, it is of
the utmost importance.
First-Class Breeding Stock.
The above shows the necessity of first-class breeding stock to start
with. I do not mean fancy stock at all, as many of the points of
excellence claimed by the American standard militate directly against
the market value of the birds. A few years ago several men came here to
buy Pekin ducks for breeding stock. On looking at the birds and getting
the price, one man said: "Those are the best birds I ever saw. I want
thirty of the best birds you have." Another said: "They are fine birds,
but I cannot afford to pay two dollars for a duck; have you no cheaper
birds?" "Yes, I have some later birds--culls from which the rest have
been selected. They are not as large as these. My late birds never
attain the size of the earlier-hatched ones, and they will not lay quite
as early. You can have your choice of these at one dollar each, which is
about their market value."
He took those birds, and I consider when he made that choice that he
threw away more than $100 of his first season's work alone, for, with a
fair share of success he might easily expect to raise 100 young birds
from each of his breeding ducks, and as the birds he chose were at least
one-third lighter than those he rejected, their progeny would not be as
heavy at a marketable age by at least one pound per bird. The excess in
cost to him, had he bought the better birds, would have been but one
cent on each of the young birds he raised. He lost, on making the choice
he did, more than twenty cents on each bird, and this is not all; those
birds will be small for generations to come. He never can get them up to
the standard of the others. They will go upon the market as small birds,
and as such, command at least two cents per pound less than the larger
ones; in fact, his losses in this transaction will represent a large
share of the profits.
How to Begin.
I will now suppose that the breeder has secured his stock, erected his
building, and is ready for business. The next thing is to feed them
well, keep them warm and comfortable, giving them as great a variety of
green food as is obtainable during the winter months, in order to induce
winter laying and insure fertility of the eggs. This matter requires
close attention, because the profits in one week of the early market
will always equal the profits in four or five of the late. The
proportion of the sexes in the early spring should be about one drake to
five or six ducks.
One point here I wish to emphasize particularly and that is in the
selection of drakes. The drakes should be, at least, two months older
than the ducks, as the latter will mature some two or three months
earlier and begin their egg production two or three months before the
drakes are ready for breeding. As a consequence, we always select our
February hatched drakes for breeding purposes.
This comes a little hard, as these birds will average to dress seven to
nine pounds at ten weeks old and will always bring, at least, 30c per
pound at that time in the market, making them worth about $2.50 each.
Would-be purchasers think we are crazy when we charge $3 each for these
birds at eight months old, expecting us to keep them for six months and
coop them for less than fifty cents.
Now this selection of early hatched birds is absolutely necessary for
good profits, as early hatched, means early reproduction and these great
profits can hardly be ignored. We sold thousands of birds the past
spring for 30c per pound, having almost complete control of Boston and
New York markets for at least six weeks.
Later in the season, when many of the ducks are off duty from a desire
to incubate, the proportion should be about one drake to ten ducks. Be
particular about this, as the eggs will be much more fertile if a part
of the drakes are removed. The feeding boxes should be long and roomy;
mine are 6x7 feet long, eight inches wide and three inches high. This is
essential, as the birds are rapid eaters, and if there is not room, some
will gorge themselves to repletion, while others will get but little. Do
not keep food by them, as that will clog their appetites, and always
effects the egg production, as well as the condition of the birds.
Keep the Feed Clean.
I have often visited poultry establishments where the food was lying
around in all conditions,--in troughs, on the ground, trodden upon,
mixed with excrement and filth; had become sour and offensive, so that
the birds would not eat it. The attendant would go his rounds
periodically and throw more food upon the already offensive mass; the
owner looking on, passively complaining that his ducks did not lay and
his ducklings would not fat.
I require my men to go the rounds after feeding, and if there is any
food left, to take it up clean. If this is insisted on they will soon
learn to feed just what is required and no more. Clean feeding is of the
utmost importance, both for young and old birds, as neither will thrive
from overfeeding, as it destroys the appetite completely. Another
essential thing is that ducks will not produce their proper quota of
fertile eggs on hard food alone.
The natural food of the duck is principally vegetable and animal, and is
obtained in brooks, puddles, swales, and consists of flag, grass roots,
small fish, pollywogs, etc. Unlike the hen, the duck has no crop,--the
passage or duct leading from the throat to gizzard direct, is very small
compared to the size of the bird. Consequently it does not assimilate or
thrive on hard food. I am continually receiving letters from amateurs
during the months of March and April, complaining that their ducks do
not lay, at the same time saying that they give them all the corn they
will eat. I write back suggesting soft food, giving ingredients and
proportions. In an incredibly short space of time a postal will come to
hand saying, "Thanks, my ducks are all laying." Success or failure in
the poultry business often date their origin from just such trivial
things as the above. So insignificant in themselves as to be entirely
overlooked by the novice who, if he is persevering, will eventually
discover both cause and remedy; but only through years of costly
experiment and a loss of valuable time which he can never recall.
How to Feed Breeding Ducks for Eggs.
There should be quite a distinction between feeding ducks to obtain a
supply of eggs and feeding them for market, as in one case the object
is to lay on fat and the other is to furnish the most available supply
of egg material. As before hinted, soft food is much more readily
utilized in a duck's organization than a hen's. We make a habit of
turning out our breeding ducks to pasture during the moulting season,
housing them in the fall according to the nature of the season, say,
from the middle of November to the first of December. We feed soft food
morning and evening composed largely of bran with a little meal, keeping
them purposely short to induce them to forage for themselves, but when
the birds are housed this is all changed.