The Peking duck was bred about three hundred years ago in China. In the century before last, it came to America, from there it spread throughout Europe. Now this breed is one of the most popular both in private households and on industrial farms. Many other varieties came from Peking ducks, including broilers.
Peking duck
Breed description
White Peking, or Chinese, duck is a rather large bird with a powerful constitution. It is slightly different from those varieties that have traditionally been bred in Europe and in Russia. Here is a short description of the breed:
- The head is medium with a convex forehead (characteristic feature).
- The beak is flat, bright orange.
- The chest is wide, powerful.
- The body is elongated.
- The back is wide.
- Legs are short, set wide apart.
- The wingspan is large, although ducks do not fly.
- The plumage is dense, white, rarely cream.
- Sex is almost the same, drakes can be slightly larger than ducks.
- Duck eggs are bluish or white in color.
What a purebred Peking duck looks like can be seen in more detail in the photo and video. If you compare the Peking and musk, you can see how much the first is larger. It is larger in size than the breeds usual for our parts. When crossing the Peking and Muscovy ducks, a mulard hybrid is obtained, which is larger than both parents.
The productivity of Peking ducks is high, therefore breeding and raising this breed is considered very profitable. The main product that can be obtained from poultry is meat. It is quite fatty, contains many complete proteins, including myosin, and useful trace elements. Meat from young ducks is more valuable than from old ones. In China, the breed is also raised to produce eggs. It is from these birds that the signature dish "Peking Duck" is prepared. Valuable are duck feather and fluff, which perfectly retain heat.
Here are the main product characteristics and descriptions of Peking:
- The weight of the drake is 3.5-4 kg, ducks - 3-3.5 kg.
- The live weight of ducklings at the age of 2 months is 2.7-3 kg.
- Egg production - 150 eggs per year.
- The egg weighs about 90 g.
With intensive rearing, ducklings are sent to the slaughter at the age of 60-70 days, until molt begins. During the molting period, the increase in mass is sharply reduced, and the feed consumption increases by 2.5 times. The hemp from feathers after molting sit tightly in the skin, so it is difficult to completely remove them. The output after slaughter is 80%, if you cut the duck, the content of edible parts will be 70% of the slaughter weight. The egg can be eaten, it does not have a specific smell or taste.
Conditions for keeping ducks
How to keep a Peking duck at home? This bird is quite unpretentious, it tolerates a temperature difference, can do well without a reservoir. When setting up a house, it is important to remember that the breed is sensitive to moisture. The content of ducks is optimal at a humidity of 65-75%.
Duck house
If there is a house or a barn in the yard, you can easily adapt it to the needs of ducks, rather than build a new one. There should be no drafts or dampness in the room, so you need to caulk all the walls, check the roof. The walls can be covered with plaster or simply covered with plywood. It is best to raise the floor 15-20 cm above the ground. Litter of peat, straw, dry leaves or sedge is laid on it. The thickness of the litter is 30 cm. It can be changed twice a year.
The temperature in the house should not fall below 10 ° C in winter, and should not rise above 25 ° C in summer. If the ducks are hot or cold, they gain weight poorly, lose feathers. At low temperatures, they huddle together, as a result, the ducklings can crush each other. At high temperatures, they spread their wings, they drink a lot.
It is important that the room is adequately ventilated. At industrial farms, hoods are installed. At home, a window is enough, its area should be 100 cm² / m² of the room. So that the ducks can freely leave the house, they will equip a hole measuring 30 × 40 cm.It is best to make it on the south or southwest wall. In winter, the house should be additionally lit. Daylight hours should last 10-12 hours.
In the summer, round-the-clock keeping in the house is not recommended. Ducks feel better on free-range or in a small aviary. When equipping an aviary, the area is allocated at the rate of 3 m2 per individual. You can put a container of water in the aviary, but this is not necessary. The area of the house for adult ducks should be 0.5 m² per individual. For ducklings, it is less than 1 m for 12-16 goals.
On industrial farms they practice cage maintenance, and the Peking duck is perfectly adapted to it. Sometimes birds are placed in tight cages 2-3 weeks before slaughter and force-fed. Then you can get a good yield of fatty meat. This is how birds are fed for the Peking Duck specialty.
Inventory
The maintenance and breeding of ducks at home requires the presence of inventory in the poultry house. You need to install there:
- feeders;
- drinkers;
- nests.
Feeders are made of boards about 2 cm thick. The bar is nailed on top so that the birds climb inside. It is advisable to make separate feeders for grain, herbs and juicy feed, mineral supplements. Drinking bowls are made of metal. Automatic drinkers are convenient, consisting of a large tank from which water flows into a metal container. You can see how they look in the photo and video.
The nests are placed on the floor, under a wall, in a secluded place so that no one bothers the duck that rushes. The birds are rather shy, afraid of any rustle. They carry eggs in the morning, so it is advisable not to go into the barn at this time. The height of the nest is 30-40 cm, the width is about 50 cm. A small sill is made in front so that the litter does not crumble and no eggs fall out.
Proper care of the nests is very important. The litter in them is changed daily, after collecting eggs. The floor and all the rooms where the ducks live should be cleaned once a week. If you adhere to hygiene, the birds will not be afraid of diseases.
Feeding ducks
Maintaining and raising Peking ducks for meat at home also provides for proper feeding. This breed has a very intense metabolism. Their body temperature is 42.2 ° C, the intestines are only 20 cm long. Grain fodder lingers in it for 4 hours, and greens and wet mash - for 3 hours. At the same time, the food is very well absorbed. This intensive metabolism allows the ducks to be fattened very quickly. They eat constantly and quickly grind all the feed.
Summer and winter bird feeding is different. If Peking ducks are free-range in the summer, they get some food themselves. It is enough to feed the bird 2-3 times a day. True, the mass gain in this mode is slower. In the summer there is no need for additional vitamin supplements. In winter, ducks are fed 4 times a day and given vitamins. Duck rearing is made easier by the fact that they are omnivores. Calmly eat grass, kitchen waste. So that the meat yield is greater, and the mass gain is fast, the diet includes:
- grain (corn, wheat, barley, oats);
- legumes (mostly peas);
- wheat bran;
- grass flour (in winter) and fresh green grass (in summer);
- greens of legumes (alfalfa, tops of beans and peas);
- vegetables (cabbage, carrots, pumpkin, zucchini, potatoes);
- bone or fish meal;
- Brewer's yeast;
- cake and oilseed meal;
- mineral additives (gravel, chalk, shells).
For a Peking duck to get well, there must be a lot of protein on the menu. Of the plants, legumes contain the most proteins; there are a lot of them in corn and wheat. Animal proteins come with meat and bone meal. You can feed the ducks with skim milk, sour milk, if there is a cow on the farm. When a large farm is engaged in feeding, most often it uses compound feeds. The house should be constantly fresh water, not less than 600 ml per bird per day.
Breeding ducklings
Breeding Peking ducks is not difficult. Young growth is distinguished by good health and high survival rate. Peking ducks are not the best brood hens, but this disadvantage is compensated for by a high percentage of fertilization and hatchability, even with artificial incubation.
In the temperate climate zone, ducks begin to lay in late February or early March. They can lead 2-3 broods per season. In hot climates, they rush all year round, can give up to 4 offspring. The hen is able to hatch 12-16 eggs at a time, the incubation period is 26-28 days. Hatchery breeding allows more ducklings to be reared.
Hatched chicks require adequate heating and round-the-clock lighting. The temperature should be 28-30 ° C. You can warm the ducklings with an electric heating pad or lamp. In the first 2 weeks, up to 20 chicks can be placed on 1 square meter. From the second week, the ducklings need to be relocated to a more spacious room. From the third week they can live in a regular poultry house.
Feeding ducklings
The ducklings are fed first with a boiled egg and curd. For 2-3 days, you can cut nettle, quinoa, grass. Chicks eat at this time often, every 2-3 hours. At the end of the first week, boiled or steamed millet is included in the diet. From the tenth day, ducklings can be released into the street, then they are transferred to five meals a day. If they grow up with a duck, she begins to bring them to the yard earlier. Chicks know how to swim from the first days of life.
From the third week, ducklings are transferred to feeding with grain, herbs, vegetables. Cereal feed is introduced gradually so as not to cause digestive disorders. The need for proteins during this period falls. If in the first ducklings in the diet protein is 20%, then in the future - 11-15%.
Broodstock selection
If you are planning independent breeding, it is imperative to form a broodstock. It is best to select May and September ducklings for this, they are the strongest. The selection is carried out three times. Immediately after birth, Peking ducklings are evaluated according to the following indicators:
- Weight and size of the duckling (weight must be at least 50 g).
- The state of plumage (evenly pigmented, fluffy).
- Ducklings are active and eat well.
- Excitability of the nervous system (reaction to feeding, grooming, approaching the duck of the mother or host).
The next selection is correct in the third week. It is important to determine not only how much a duckling weighs, but also how it grows and adds mass, to identify defects that could go unnoticed in the early days. The last selection is carried out in 150 days, sending for slaughter all rejected birds. One brood flock should have one drake per 6-8 ducks, then breeding will be successful. If you add a musk drake to Peking ducks, you can get mulard ducklings. Unlike their parents, they are sterile, as Peking and Muscovy ducks belong to different species, but the hybrid will have more mass.
Advantages and disadvantages of the breed
Rearing and breeding at home Peking ducks is very popular. On industrial farms, these ducks take first place. Why are poultry farmers so fond of them? Birds have a number of benefits:
- Early maturity and rapid weight gain.
- Great taste of meat.
- Big and tasty egg.
- A high percentage of fertilization and hatchability of ducklings.
- Adaptability to any climate (the duck is not afraid of frost, tolerates heat well).
- Ducks eat anything, which makes feeding much easier.
- Content without reservoirs is permissible.
Peking ducks do not need to be looked after for a long time: ducklings are slaughtered from two months. Such precocity allows growing 2-3 broods per season.
But there are no ideal breeds, the Peking breed also has its drawbacks. These include:
- Crying (ducks can be heard throughout the yard, which not everyone likes).
- Reduced maternal instinct - Peking ducks do not hatch eggs well.
- Sensitivity to dampness.
As you can see, there are not so many shortcomings in this breed. Because the ducks of the Peking breed do not lose their positions, they consistently receive positive reviews. Even the new hybrids, of which the Peking people became the founders, cannot completely oust them from the market. Peking duckling costs an average of 250 rubles, an incubation egg - 50-100 rubles, an adult breeding duck - about 600-700 rubles.