Page:Ducks- and how to make them pay (IA cu31924003102971).pdf/37

Rh for them, viz., scraps of cold meat, fat, vegetables, pudding, potato parings, &c. These should all be put into an old saucepan and boiled up together, then mixed with the meal. Ducks should be fed according to circumstances. There need not be a particle of anything wasted where there are ducks kept. Now we come to which are the best meals to use for the morning feed. This depends, of course, a great deal upon what is mixed with the meals. If there are a number of rich scraps, viz., meat, fat, &c., from the kitchen, then the meal does not require to be quite so nutritious. Sharps, which some people call thirds, with a little barley meal and biscuit meal, is a good thing. It is always well, whenever meal is used, to add a little biscuit meal, as it helps to mix so much better, and prevents the mixture from being sticky. The biscuit meal should be soaked in hot water, or a little put in with the hot scraps does just as well. Where there is but very little meat of any kind, it is well to have a mixture of meals, viz., a little bone meal, oatmeal, and French buckwheat meal, mixed up with sharps, middlings, or barley-meal. Those who are able to make their own meal will do well to make a little change for their ducks at times. Whatever is mixed in the way of meals should not be mixed too soft, but rather dry, just so that the meal clings together, and there are no little pieces of dry flour. If so, that is a great waste. If it is mixed too wet it sticks to the duck's beak, and they do not like it. I always find that the best plan is to feed ducks from a trough, unless one has a great deal of grass, and the food can be thrown down in a clean place on fresh ground every