Green animals » ducksChoosing a Breed
Aylesbury- Plump, healthy, glossy bird with white plumage. They lay large white or blue-green eggs.
Indian Runner- Good choice for around orchards. They are the best breed if you don’t have a pond, as they will get by with only a water container to dip their heads in. Great egg layers but a bit stringy for eating. Have a very comical upright stance.
Khaki Campbell- A great layer breed. A mature duck will lay 300 odd eggs a year.
Peking- one of the noisier breeds of duck. A good layer and good for eating as well.
My Peking Ducks helping to keep the snail population down.
My pick of the breeds is the Peking for meat and eggs and the Indian Runner as they are great layers.
Most regional authorities have no restrictions on keeping drakes so it is possible to have a pair of ducks to breed from. Offspring can be sold for income or kept to replace older stock.
To sex a duck when young, pick up a duckling, if it makes a loud quaking noise it is proberly a female. When the adult plumage has developed the males have a curl in their tail! Female ducks are the noisy ones they make that funny loud ‘laughing’ quake whenever they are alerted to something. Mine do this to tell me to let them out of their pen for the day.
