POULTRY KEEPING.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVII, Issue 91, 17 April 1936, Page 14

POULTRY KEEPING.

MARKETING DUCKS. VALUE OF TRAINING. (By ORPINGTON.) Although most farmers' wives know that young drakes are at their best for eating and a great deal easier to prepare, before they are twelve weeks old, yet a great number are sent to the mart weeks later than this and realise next to nothing for the rearing. A possible explanation for feeding them so long (and how young ducklings do eat!) is that some do not find it easy to know which aro the drakes until they develop curly tails. They can be distinguished at a day or two old by examining the vent of the ducklings. Tho drake shows a small copula, like a tiny hanging piece of flesh, just inside the cloaca, and this is absent altogether in tho duck. But few wish to bother rearing drakelets and ducklets separately.

However, by tho time they are eight weeks old at the latest, the ducks of all tho usual breeds —Runners, Campbells, Pekins and the favourite farm crossbreds —develop a good resonant "quack." They may not uso it frequently, but, if grasped by the neck, will let you know if they are ducks. The drakes have just a slight hissing noiso which they use in protest.

This does not, however, apply to that large silent breed of so-called ducks, the Muscovys. These are a species to themselves and have practically no call note. When they are fully grown, there is a great deal of difference in the size of tho duck and drako and, by tho time they are ready for eating, at about nine weeks, this is already apparent. The drakes have rather thicker legs with very big joints, tho body is larger, the neck rather thicker and the tail is decidedly longer and broader than that of tho young ducks of the same age.

It is of course most helpful of all if the owner can see the competition pens the birds are going to occupy and let them have similar quarters for six weeks or so before the contests starts. Young ducks that have been used to just an open run to sleep in or have not been confined at all will possibly not make use of the shelter provided at the contest, being too sliy to go inside, even in bad weather, for some time. And this might again placc tliem at some disadvantage.

The feeding, too, should be studied, and if possible, similar rations given to those fed at the contest for at least a few weeks before. For instance, ducks that have been reared on grain feeding will take to mash very well, but if they have been used to wet mash only, they may not take kindly to grain feed as part of their ration.

But most important is the matter of handling the ducks and taming them by that means. It takes time and patience, but having ducks (and pullets too) thoroughly tamo before sending them to a contest is half the battle. Then they travel without upset and settle down more quickly to any change in their surroundings, so that there will bo no perceptible check to prevent their continuing to lay or coming into production very shortly after theiroarrival.

Training Ducks. Those who intend having a try at entering birds for the laying contests will be well advised to commence taming the selected ducks at a very early age, for it will pay them well to do so. All birds and animals seem to be more or less creatures of habit, and ducks particularly so, even although they are really very intelligent too.

The easiest way to commence the training is to keep the young ducks :in fairly confined space, so that they are continually coming in contact with those who are feeding them. Ducks are not nearly so often kept in small space sis are liens, and they are generally :in much bigger flocks than the three or six that may be sent to have their laying recorded. A small run only will do the selected birds no harm so long as they arc fed all their requirements in the way of greenfeed, and meat meal in their mash—or they can be let out on greater range for part of the day. The main thing is to see that their attendant makes a practice of handling the birds, and this cannot be done if they are always on wide range. One must, naturally, bo very gentle in every movement close to confined ducks. The young stock comes through a very nervous stage, when they panic at the slightest thing, and very little is required to make them even lose the power of locomotion and tumble over on their backs. But Is it better for future results that they learn to be tame at this early age than when (hey should be coming into lay.

Turkey Rearing. A very important matter when setting out to rear turkeys is to realise that feeding for them, especially after the first month, is not by any means the same as that required for chicks or ducklings. A farmer's wife in this locality who has been particularly successful with turkeys year after year put it rather neatly recently when she said they must have very little food that will ferment. This expression applies to all the grains and to bread, pollard and bran, but not, of course, to green feed, meat or moat and bone meals and mil,k or vegetables. The use of dry skim milk curd with a big proportion of green stuff has been a great boon to many turkey rearers of recent years. The turkey chicks need a very big proportion of protein, especially after they are a few weeks old, and this the milk curd supplies without "fexpense. If the cows aro well supplied with lime there will also Va that mineral in the curd to assist greatly with the frame-forming of young turkeys. It is only by correct feeding in the early stages that these birds can be in sufficiently robust condition to feather easily and so not feel the effects of "shooting the red," which is the time they often prove so delicate.

For all one's care and good feeding, however, it is impossible to rear turkeys satisfactorily on ground that is infected with "blackhead." This accounts for more sickness and deaths among turkeys than any other cause and is far more general than is realised. It affects the liver, which organ if examined after death can readily tell its own tale even to the novice. Whereas a healthy liver is perfectly even, dark purple-chocolate in colour, that of a diseased bird has a distinctly mottled appearance showing marks like those in marble, without any raising- of the surface. A liver affected by tuberculosis is again quite different, showing raised v jjite or grey nodules —but tins is not common in. turkeys.

Where tliis blackhead or turkey liver disease has made its appearance the only advice can be to give lip rearing turkeys or else to rear them intensively in large airy sheds until they are three months of age. The main advantaga of the latter method is that the floor litter, through which infection occurs, can be changed very frequently so that; birds do not become affected badly even should infection be brought in from tins ground ouiwde.