Page:Ducks- and how to make them pay (IA cu31924003102971).pdf/32

18 keep them for weeks and months idle. I have known young ducklings, hatched in March, not to lay until the following March; and I have known others, hatched in August, to be in full lay early in February; but of course the latter had different treatment. I have had ducks lay at six months old. The proper way to manage the stock ducks after they have moulted is to feed them very sparingly on ordinary food, such as bran, rice, and brewers' grains, mixed up with a little meal—viz., barley meal or sharps—and a few oats in their water, when they are put up at night, varying occasionally with a little maize. If ducks have a good range they should have nothing but grain, as they will find plenty of insect life until the end of October. They should be treated in this way until that date or even a little later with those who have not the convenience for breeding early young ducklings. There are three months when the stock birds should be kept in this way, and the cost of them should not be more than one penny per week each. When they have their liberty in running about the farm and ponds they want scarcely anything at all to eat; if you give them anything they seldom eat it. The exercise in a grass field or farmyard, where they have to work for their living, keeps their fat down. Ducks do not scratch in the same way that fowls do to exercise themselves. To make up for this a little grain should be thrown into the duck-pond when they are kept in confinement, and they will be standing upon their heads trying to fish this out; this keeps them busy for hours in the day. If the owner has only a garden path or passage