Democratic Sentinel, Volume 15, Number 34, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 11 September 1891 — THE POULTRY YARD. [ARTICLE]

THE POULTRY YARD.

Duck Keeping, I shall endeavor to make It clear that ducks, when properly managed, are a source of profit, and oven when kept in very confined places. With only an available space of from eight to ten square yards, a pen of ducks can be kept with less trouble, cleaner and healthier than a pen of fowls. There are very many who start keeping ducks that soon give them up through some fault in the system of management, and having failed to keep them in a satisfactory manner, they condemn them and say they are dirty creatures, big eaters, cannot be kept healthy in confined places, are unprofitable, etc., all of which is wholly without foundation. As regards cleanliness, there is not any creature that takes more time and care in cleaning itself. The duck will preen and dress its feathers by the hour together; therefore, If It has the means it will keep itself clean. They will live and thrive upon coarser and less costly food than fowls, and yield a greater weight of eggs. Scraps, potato parings and other waste from the food supply of most houses is usually thrown into the dustbin; this cooked and mixed with middlings (the dressings from wheaten flour) will generally be found to be sufficient food for a pen of ducks. Still they should have some corn each day. When keeping Aylesbury, Pekin, or common farmyard ducks. I have always had more than eighty eggs from each during the season, averaging in weight two and one quarter ounces. Some people object to the flavor of the eggs, which depends very much upon where' the ducks are kept and the kind of food supplied to them. The eggs supplied with clean water, sweet and wholesome food, and kepi on a smooth hard floor which is kept clean, are entirely different from those from ducks that seek for food in muddy ponds and foul ditches. Though my own ducks are kept In rather close confinement, I have never lost one, old or young through disease;

and consequently their state of health has never been a cause of anxiety but a pleasure to contemplate.—lF. Vale in Feathered World.