Part 3

While going the rounds of Boston market one pleasant June day, shortly after our experience with the Aylesburys, we noticed some fine young birds nicely dressed, that had evidently snow-white plumage. As this was before the advent of iced poultry, we supposed the birds had come from the regions of the far South, and our curiosity was excited. We interviewed the dealer and was surprised to learn that the birds were grown to the north of us, and that they were the Pekin ducks we had heard of for a year or two, but had taken no stock in. Yet here they were in the market, while ours were toddling about at home less than half grown. Here was a revelation. We procured some eggs of this party, at once, and in due time hatched out sixty lively young ducklings. They were tended with the utmost care and not one was lost. We were very much interested in these little fellows, they were so hardy, and you could fairly see them grow. It occurred to me at this time to try and experiment with these ducklings, keep a correct account of all food consumed by them, and ascertain what they cost per pound when ready for market. The average weight was taken from the rejected drakes which we did not need for breeding purposes, and which were culled out and sent to market at ten weeks old. We were very much surprised to find the cost to us (exclusive of the cost of eggs) was about 4-3/4 cents per pound. We could hardly credit our own eyes. The calculation was made again and again with the same result. The same calculation was made a year later on two yards of some three hundred ducklings with a result obtained, when ready for market, of 5-1/4 cents per pound, including cost of eggs.

As I had long since left the paternal abode, and for years had ceased to 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.