The Apricot Centre

I have a 4 acre organic orchard and once a year I raise a flock of 100 organic ducks for the table (to eat!). They complement fruit growing and create a very small mixed farming system that functions very well. I normally start them off around Christmas time so they are ready for Easter.

It is classic case of the benefit of multiple yields; the ducks graze the grass, eat pests of the orchard, leaving manure as they go. This saves me a job of moving 3 tonnes of manure every year, if I could source it. I cannot buy in manure and compost it anymore as most animals are now fed with GM soya, and this is not allowed under organic rules. I could buy in organic manure if it were for sale, but of course most organic farmers keep it to raise their own fertility of their own fields.

The Ducks are also very sociable animals, people come to visit them, they play with them as fluffy duckling’s and chase them as huge beautiful ducks. The children try to name them and count them spending hours in the barn. When they start to graze the orchard my 2 daughters will herd them and chase them around laughing, the ducks perhaps not enjoying it so much, quacking. Once “dressed” and ready for the table more people come to collect them and stay for a chat and tea, and of course we cook them ourselves and share them with friends for special meals. They taste delicious !

I also make a little bit of money from them, and have to remind myself when it is a shockingly low amount of these multiple yields, that the flock of ducks is not just about money.
I buy them as day old ducklings from a hatchery, as there is no local organic hatchery I have to buy non organic ones. They are housed in a barn on organic straw and fed with organic feed that I buy in and once they are a month old I start taking them out in to the orchard daily. They have to be kept in with electric fence to keep the foxes off, and I get up at 6.00am to take them out before the school run. They get put to bed and fed when its going dark. It takes only 14-16 weeks until they are of a size to eat. They are then humanely killed on site (not by me- cant quite manage that bit yet!) and “dressed” in a local tiny game abattoir.

Ideally I would have a permanent flock that I bred my own duckling from, but then I would need a mobile house to move around the orchard that would cost £1000’s and I would then have to be on site 365 days of the year. Something I am not quite ready for just yet.
Anyhow I am not raising duck this year ‘cos of the outbreak of bird flu in Suffolk, I live a mile from the Suffolk border in Essex and I couldn’t bring the baby ducklings across the border into Essex and out of the restricted zone. Also the price of wheat has gone up 40% this year because of the wet summer last year, so I would make even less money or have to put the price up so high I am not sure anyone would buy one.

So I am having a quiet January and get to lie in until 7.00 am !