As it seems some of my posts are disappearing from the drafts, I really need this today.
Even if I can not afford things, it behooves me to serve as long as breath is in this body as that is the purpose in all of this.
People in cities have a problem in urbania, as cities are filled with the refuse of all the residue which failed in the country and hides in a city to survive.
Neighbors being a Dutch word have nothing in cities, as the occupants next to most people are self serving, brain dead asses who should be eating WMD's when all of this Obama Abyss wonder melts down in social degeneration.
You though need to eat, and in most cases cities do not allow things to eat beyond gardens, and people do need protein.
Chickens, ducks, geese, guineas in the poultry are all too loud. Large animals tend to either smell or they need too much space to live on a house lot.
In working on this situation, for small acreages, I have come up with something, that is survivable and this animal is quiet...and no it is not a rabbit, as a person will starve to death eating bunnies due to low calorie content in the meat.
The animal is a MUSCOVY DUCK. These ducks are from South America and while the ducklings do peep, the adults just "hiss". Hissing is something that will not upset anal retentive neighbors and that means they are attractive to close settings.
My experience with Scovy ducks has been going on for some time. The literature all warns about pinioning ducks as they will fly. Yes all ducks will fly, but I have found that if one feeds Scovies, in making them heavy, they can not get off the ground to fly in being a tree duck that roosts.
Ducks come in 3 types, meat, runner for weeding and eggs. Ducks though unless you like duck, tastes like duck, like goose tastes like goose and turkeys taste like turkey. I like duck and goose, but still I can only eat about a duck a week and a goose a month before I start thinking, like turkeys.....that turkey twice a year is about all I want them on my table either.
Muscovy are said to taste like veal. I have no idea what veal tastes like as I never ate baby beef. Scovy duck to me tastes unique, but no waterfowl flavor. It reminds me more of rabbit and I am not that fond of bunny as it is a sweet taste to me like a Northern Pike fish is sweet and I do not like eating that type of fish non stop either.
In that said, the meat is quite white and is not that mystery in a person could live on it in various forms.
Scovies drawbacks are like all ducks in they do like shoveling in grain like a pig which costs money. They also will forage on insects like chickens will for most of the summer if allowed to run.
No poultry is immune to predators, so these ducks will have to be penned and fenced as in stock panels in a run for them.
They also have claws and will cut you as adults if you do not have on a heavy canvas type coat while administering the coup de grace.
I had a large male eat a banam chick too so they do like meat and will eat baby other things just like pigs will in being ominvores like humans.
After those brief caveats, the Scovy has like bunnies a habbit in they breed like rabbits. I can recall clutches of dozens of chicks in I could not see how one little hen could maintain that many eggs, but they will hatch a great deal of babies which grow up to food source for you and your family.
As you can see a few Scovy hens would provide all the white duck meat you would want to eat for the year.
I personally like the pied or black and white muscovy ducks. We had white when I was a child and the hens were always rough looking and yellow, as they produced so much oil in the oil ducts they turned yellow from that necessary preening.
The pied were more pretty to me and had less carbuncles, which are red turkey like manifestation by their bills.
They do need shelter in are not long extended zero degree and deep snow birds. So like any chicken they need a hutch to live in.
They like water like all ducks and will deal without things to splash in, as water makes a smelly mess when left in summer heat in all the microbes.
The end analysis is, these ducks are quiet, breed readily, provide eggs and meat, eat insects, and are able to scrounge for food up to a point in helping to feed them.
The drawbacks are predators do eat them like all fowl. They will scratch when they are adults and they might fly, but that has not been my experience.
For a country setting, it is possible to raise a protein source which is varied in sheep which is gamey tasting, milk goats, rabbits, chickens and these muscovy ducks. These animals are not "chicken tasting nor beef" as real chickens which free range and breed do have a chicken flavor, but I consider when one is starving that just about anything starts looking good to eat.
It is just a thing for the modern urbanite to comprehend, like real sweet corn actually tastes like corn and not this sweet sugar frankenfood of no flavor.
Guess that is enough of the million dollar knowledge.
While I earn nothing from this hatchery in Oklahoma, they have treated me right in the past and I can attest in a previous time, that my ducks were vigorous when they arrived and the hatchery sent instructions how to care for them out of the box to keep them from having problems.
The main things with birds is, they heed heat, as in a light bulb which will not fall to the floor and start a fire to keep them warm at about 90 degrees as they are babies. A brooder or box high enough so the ducks will not jump out. I came home to find one of my goat kids babysitting one snuggled up to it.......yes I have ducks in the house for the first weeks before they get too big and aromatic.
They need food and they need water.....no medicated feed as that will kill them.
Do that and you will not hear a peep out of them. Do not do that, and birds will drive some people nuts.
The box will have to be about one foot high starting out, as these ducks will jump out, as they are like Wood ducks in jumping up and knowing how to use those little claws.
nuff said
agtG
