Ducks!

[baymule]

Actually, for the NFL teams bodies, I just turned the hens out, they made short work of them and now they are laying twice a day!

 

[Wishin']

 

[TheSeedObsesser]

All of the eggs must be double-yolkers?

 

[baymule]

OK, I roasted a duck for our supper. OMG!!! It was sooooooo good! There was nothing left, we ate it all and the dogs ate the bones. ZERO leftovers. DH said I should have roasted two! Even my mom got seconds. Most recipes call for a plum sauce or something like that. I had some lemon fig preserves, so I heated some up and we used that for a sweet sauce. DEEELICIOUS!

After these loud mouth Pekins hit the freezer (have 9 to go) the next time I get ducks, it'll be muscovies. At least they aren't so noisy.

 

[TheSeedObsesser]

I'm guessing that you have a fence of some sort since you have Paris, that will come in handy when you get your Muscovies. Muscovies like to explore a lot of places, including the road! The females can fly pretty darn well, I'd say clip all of their wings when they reach full maturity. I've read that they like to perch in trees, but we've never seen one do that. If you're neighbor has a pool or pond, don't let the Muscovies discover it! (A large and deep body of water is what the ducks like, we have a large 2-3 acre pond and they go nuts to be let out there.) If you think that the Pekins tasted good, I think that you'll be blown away by the Muscovies. While they aren't half as noisy as Pekings, Muscovies can get a little bit on the noisy side if you're keeping them in large groups or if one gets hurt. Muscovies aren't completely mute - the females make a "whistley" sound for most of the year and an odd tweet when they're broody. Muscovies can tame up very nicely (sometimes even when you're not trying to tame them), we have a few that actually beg for corn. They have a really odd social system within the flock; lot's of head-bobbing, whistling. You may see a female occasionally "mate" another female, it's likely that those two ducks are closely bonded. It can be hard when slaughtering time comes, but don't forget that they taste good! Sirloin steak would be a good comparison.

 

[baymule]

It is raining. Pouring down and the ducks are out playing in it. That's ok, but do they have to tell the whole durn town? Whack, Quack, Whack...... Duckies your days are numbered.....

@TheSeedObsesser I have a small backyard with a chain link fence. Before we brought Paris home, we raised the fence another 2' with welded wire. We are in the middle of our small town, mere blocks from city hall and the police department, so no chance of our neighbors having a pond. If I get ducks again, it would be maybe a trio of Muscovies and I would clip their wings. But for now, I'm gonna get these Pekins in the freezer and see if the 3 runners will be any quieter. If they get diarrhea of the quacker, off to freezer camp they go!

 

[baymule]

Saturday May 17, I butchered 4 ducks. There were still a few pinfeathers that I removed with needle nose pliers. They were plump, meaty and looked real good. It still took awhile to get them from the pen to the freezer, but NOTHING like picking the 8 week old porcupine pinfeathered torture ducks from demon land I was stupid enough to do last time.

They are 12 weeks old today. Tomorrow I will butcher the remaining 5 ducks. The Pekins make horrible neighbors. They sleep all day and party all night. QUACK-WHACK-QUACK!!! All night long.

 

[baymule]

Ducks. Are. Gone. To. Freezer. Camp.

I put the 3 Runners in the coop with the chickens and put my momma hen with 5 chicks in the duck pen. They happily scratched and pecked all day. They did a fair job of turning the duck compost. I'll put them back in there tomorrow.

12 weeks is a good age for processing Pekins. They were a decent size, about 4 pounds plus. My scale died so I don't know for sure. Maybe a few could go 5 pounds. Several days ago there was still a few pinfeathers. Today the pinfeathers were DOWN pinfeathers and a whole lot harder to get rid of.

 

[baymule]

The day I butchered the last of the ducks was the same day that three friends came over to visit. I was blood splattered, feathered, and up to my elbows in dead ducks. I looked like an axe murderer. And THIS is the day that everybody decided to drop in? I couldn't stop, they just had to watch and visit at the same time. Fortunately, they are ok with growing gardens, hunting and butchering, but still, I was literally a bloody mess!

I saved the visceral fat and rendered it in boiling water. So now I have some really nice duck fat that I will be able to use in cooking.

Cooked another duck Saturday night and simmered the carcass for hours for the broth. I saved the fat from cooking the duck, as I use it for stir fry and other cooking.

I turned the chickens into the duck pen and they plowed it up for me. I must have put 40 bags of leaves in the pen. When it got all poopy, I tossed in 3 more bags of leaves. The ducks loved diving in the leaves and eating whatever goodies they found in them, mostly acorns. so the ducks made compost, the chickens turned it and today I planted corn in the duck pen. I planned to plant corn in the pen when the ducks were gone, so we'll see how this goes.

 

[ninnymary]

baymule, do you save bags of leaves from the fall? I find that I don't have many leaves to add to my compost bin throughout the year. I've mentioned to my husband that I need to collect bags of leaves from neighbors or go rake them myself but I don't know where I would store them.

Mary