DUCK RERAING: A WAY TO INCREASE THE INCOME OF THE FARMER IN A LONG RUN
J. Mishra*, N. R. Sarangi1, B. P. Mishra2, R. P. Mishra3 and P. K. Rath2
1Addl.Veterinary Surgeon, Jamankira, Sambalpur, ARD, Odisha,
2College of Veterinary science & Animal Husbandry, OUAT, Bhubaneswar-751003, Odisha, 3Programme assistant (Fishery Science), KVK, Anugul, Odisha.
*Corresponding author address: Dr. Jyotiprabha Mishra, Scientist (Animal Science), KVK,Sambalpur, Chipilima, 768025. Odisha, Contact: 9438569897; Email: mishrajyotiprabha@gmail.com
Introduction:
Agriculture is being the primary source of livelihood for about 58% of India’s population. In India most of the farmers are engaging themselves in agricultural activities for their day to day activities to earn. Due to different awareness programmes, different scientific technologies adoption, and the development of different sustainable technologies and provision of different farming infrastructures such as irrigation facilities, warehousing and cold storage we are expecting increase in income of the farmers in future. India is expected to achieve the striving goal of doubling farm income by 2022. Furthermore, the rising use of genetically modified crops will likely improve the yield for farmers. Past strategy for development of the agriculture sector in India has focused primarily on raising agricultural output and improving food security. The net result has been a 45 per cent increase in per person food production, which has made India not only food self-sufficient at aggregate level, but also a net food exporting country. The major sources of growth operating within agriculture sector are improvement in productivity, resource use efficiency or saving in cost of production, increase in cropping intensity, diversification towards high value crops, increase in production of livestock, shift of cultivators to non-farm jobs. In preference to the subject farmers can engage themselves in duck farming along with agriculture to get extra income.
Duck farming plays an important part in the agricultural economy in Asian continent which alone accounts for 82.6% of the total duck meat production of world. The duck meat and eggs are relished and consumed by people worldwide. Intensive awareness to empower rural households for duck farming to increase duck egg and meat on commercial aspects by rural household production is prerequisite (Adzitey and Adzitey, 2011). The duck farming has the potential to engage rural people in duck production when provided with adequate training for it. Ducks can be raised for both commercial and small scale for meat or egg production purpose even as backyard with other birds or animals.In case of egg production, ducks lay eggs for a long time period. Duck products such as eggs and meat have a great demand as they are good source of protein and iron (Tai and Tai, 2001). The duck farming also provide manure which can be used to improve soil fertility of agricultural lands. There are readily available exotic and local breeds of ducks for production. Khaki Campbell is one of the best egg and meat producing breed in ducks having fast growth rate and efficient feed converters (Adzitey and Adzitey, 2011).
Advantages of duck farming:
Duck farming is easy because of the following advantages when compared to the rearing of other species and require lesser attention and thrive well in scavenging conditions. Need less space for raising ducks
Highly resistant to common avian diseases and can eat all types of feed available
Ducks lay more egg per bird per year than chicken
The size of the duck egg is larger than hen egg by about 15 to 20 gms.
Have a longer profitable life. They lay well even in the second
Ducks are quite hardy, more easily brooded.
Ducks lay 95 – 98% of their eggs in the morning before 9.00 AM.
So far, Khaki Campbell ducks are the best known laying breed, however many indigenous breeds are robust, capable of high level of egg production (Das et al., 2003; Nho and Tieu, 1996)
Systems of Duck Rearing: There are many ways in which ducks can be reared. In practice farmers can adapt this rearing system to their own needs and the materials available.
Free range system:
The ducks are only kept enclosed at night. During the day the ducks are free to roam outside in search of feed. They are brought inside at night by putting some extra feed in the shelter. They only require night shelter and nests for laying eggs. An advantage of this system is that the ducks go to the feed and harvest it themselves.
Confined system:
The ducks are kept enclosed permanently, either in a covered shelter (indoor system) or with a run in the open. The ducks stay in the same place. An outside run makes it easier to give the ducks access to water, as a pond can be put in the open run area.
Indoor system: The indoor system is for large-scale duck farms and requires more investment than the other two systems of housing. Farmer has to provide all feed and water and clean it on daily basis. Management should be proper for getting fast growth. There should be provision of large shallow container with water so that ducks can wash and bathe.
Integrated Duck Rearing Systems:
Duck keeping combines well with other forms of farming. In these systems the different forms of production complement each other and the farmer will have better production and more profit. Waste and by-products are used. Duck rearing with paddy cultivation: In paddy fields ducks eat harmful insects and snails, this is a help for the paddy and at the same time the ducks get nutritious feed. The farmer spreads risks. For example if the rice yield is low there is still a yield of eggs and duck meat.
Migratory duck farming:
It is a method of duck farming practiced by the poor agricultural laborers in South India. Farmer starts duck farming during December by rearing ducklings. Ducklings were obtained from large farmers. By February as the harvest of second crop of paddy is over the laborers starts migration with the ducks. The paddy cultivators of Tamil Nadu and Kerala generally welcome the ducks. The ducks feed on left away paddy grains on the field as well as snails and small fishes. Water stirring caused by the ducks activities inhibits the growth of weeds through photosynthesis reduction when the water becomes turbid. Their activities also enhance the rice root, stalk and leaf development, thereby accelerating rice growth. In addition, a reduced application of pesticides and fertilizers benefits the ecological system. During night the ducks are stays on the fields. One or two hours after sunrise, the ducks are released, by which time egg lying is almost completed and eggs can easily be collected. Owners of the land are given duck eggs as remuneration. The ducks grows well by feeding on paddy fields and the fields in turn become fertile by duck castings.
Duck rearing combined with fish ponds:
The waste from the duck shed can be recycled and may be used for fish culture in integrated duck-fish farming which increases the production of natural flora in the ponds as well as enhances the fish production. In this way a farmer can get more return. If the ducks are allowed to swim freely in the fishponds, the waste can be dispersed uniformly in the ponds and it can also be used as a good fertilizer. Besides this growth of the aquatic weeds prevented and biological productivity of the ponds increases, the amount of oxygen in the ponds gets increased due to swimming action of the ducks in pond. In duck – cum fish culture, fishes with 10 cm length only to be stocked because fishes less than this length may be eaten by the ducks. Fish seeds can be stocked at the rate of 10000 numbers/ha. Depending upon the nature of the fishpond and the availability of fish seeds the stocking density may vary. Rising of ducks depends upon the type of the species and egg laying capacity. To get more meat and egg from the duck-fish culture, proper management plays a vital role. The shed should be well ventilated and stagnant of waste water should be prevented. For fertilizing 1 ha pond, 200 ducks are sufficient.
Duck farming in backyard:
A shallow pond can be made by using polythene sheet, bricks and cement pond or shallow container containing water with provision of outlet for cleaning purpose on specific interval basis as seeing the condition of the shallow pond. As water is a necessary thing in duck rearing we can rear by providing a shallow pond and area around that to scavenge and home food and broken rice and other alternative foods like azolla can be given for their feeding purpose.
Feeding Management of Ducks:
Most of the duck farmers fed with broken rice, rice bran, coconuts stem powder or similar products between hatching and 4 weeks of age. In some places ducklings are given sago and grains purchased from market as feed. Feed should be given mixing with water.
Experiments or trials conducted:
Experiment 1:
The Khaki Campbell an improved breed of duck was intervened in tribal village of Saraitoli, Ranchi, Jharkhand. The average age of bird laid first egg at 151±2.11 days and body weight was recorded 1553±17.26 g. The first laid egg weight was found 61± 0.26 g, whereas after 36 and 52 weeks, it was found 62± 2.23 g and 64± 3.57 g, respectively. The average total egg production per bird was recorded 126.58 ± 1.87 numbers. The total cost of production was found INR (Indian rupees) 430.23 per bird and production cost per kg of live weight was INR 182.98. The cost of feed, 30 days old ducklings and medicine, transportation cost, etc was calculated about 56.35 %, 41.84 % and 1.81% of the total production cost, respectively. The gross return per bird was found INR 726.15. The net returns per live bird including sell of egg and fresh live weight was INR 295.92. The proportion of egg and meat gross income accounts for 35.21 % and 64.76 %, respectively. The gross expenditure incurred of INR 42,592.70 and gross income of INR 71,889.00 was found in duck farming. The net income obtained from the duck farming was INR 2663.30 /household/year with benefit –cost ratio of 1:1.69. The meat -feed ratio was found 3.44. (Jha BK. Chakrabarti, 2017).
Experiment 2:
The study revealed that Khaki Campbell ducks gained significant body wt. during initial phase which reversed for native ducks after 16th wk of age due to its better scavenging ability from environment. Attainment of sexual maturity with significantly more egg production up to 40th wk was observed in Khaki Campbell where as egg wt and other egg traits were better in native ducks. Initial mortality in case of native ducks was little higher; however, by 6 months of age no such difference between the varieties was found. It may be concluded that both Khaki Campbell and native ducks performed well under extensive system of management. (Giri et. al., 2014)
Experiment 3:
Another study by (Roy et al., 2017) reported that the Khaki Campbell duck rearing was very profitable with an estimated benefit cost (B: C) ratio of 2.34 while for local ducks it was recorded as 1.84.
Conclusion:
Farmers can adopt many technologies to increase their production to attain a better income and as a diversified and integrated approach when followed one can get more return in long run. So duck rearing along with main agricultural activity may act as a good solution in achieving the goal of doubling farmer’s income in future.
Reference:
- Adzitey F, Adzitey S P (2011). Duck production: Has a potential to Reduce Poverty among Rural Households in Asian Communities –A review J. World’s Poult. Res. 1(17- 10).http.//jwpr.science-line.com/
- Das, G.B., Haque, M.E., Ali, M.L., Chandra, G.C. and Das, C. 2003. Performance of Indian Runner, Zending and Khaki Campbell in integrated duck-cum-fish farming system. Pakistan Journal of Biological Sciences. 6(3): 198-201.
- EMERGING TRENDS IN BACKYARD DUCK FARMING IN INDIA Praween Srivastava, CEO, Livestock Business Consultancy services (LBCS)
- Https://www.ibef.org/
- Jha BK. Chakrabarti A (2017). Duck farming: a potential source of livelihood in tribal village. J. Anim. Health. Prod. 5(2): 39-43.
- Lesson 13: duck farming for eggs and meat
- Nho, L.T. and Tieu, H.V. 1996. Egg production and economic efficiency of Khaki Campbell ducks reared on locally available feedstuffs in the coastal land stretch of the Red River Delta. Livestock Research for Rural Development. 9(1): 1-4.
- Production performance of ducks under extensive system of management in tribal districts of Odisha S.C. GIRI*, S.K. SAHOO, S.K. KARNA, S. SARAN1 , K.V.H. SASTRY AND N. KANDI Regional Centre, Central Avian Research Institute, In front of Kalinga Studio, Bhubaneswar-751 003. Indian Journal of Poultry Science (2014) 49(1): 97-100; Research Article.
- Roy, A., P.S. Roy, S. Datta, A. Haldar, U. Roy, P.K. Pathak, S. Patra, A. Taleb and Maji, A. 2017. Supplementing Rural Livelihoods through Backyard Duckery Farming in Murshidabad District of West Bengal, India. Int.J.Curr.Microbiol.App.Sci. 6(12): 3460-3466. Doi: https://doi.org/10.20546/ijcmas.2017.612.402
- Roy, A., P.S. Roy, S. Datta, A. Haldar, U. Roy, P.K. Pathak, S. Patra, A. Taleb and Maji, A. 2017. Supplementing Rural Livelihoods through Backyard Duckery Farming in Murshidabad District of West Bengal, India. Int.J.Curr.Microbiol.App.Sci. 6(12): 3460-3466. doi: https://doi.org/10.20546/ijcmas.2017.612.402.
- Tai C and Tai J J L (2001). Future Prospects of Duck Production in Asia. J. Poult. Sci. 38: 99-112. https://doi.org/10.2141/ jpsa.38.99.
