Purebreed vs cross breed etc

[cmbeall]

Hello

We have three breeds of ducks at this time....Blue Swedish, Rouens and Pekin. It is my desire to breed my swedes pure and sell the ducklings. I am considering this as well for rouens. The pekins we wanted to us as egg layers. We have considered keeping the flock pure but I was curious to input as what breed do any of you have experience/knowledge of to mix with my pekins and maybe the rouens. I am looking mainly for egg production as opposed to meat birds.

THanks so much...and I am learning so much from the boards.

Cathy

 

[70%cocoa]

If you are looking for egg production I would buy some Runners, Campbells or Welsh Harlequins from a breeder that selects for egg production. However you might find that the breeds you have do pretty well on the egg front. My Swedish lay really well!

If you don't want to buy in more breeds then just see which birds lay well from your current flock and breed from those. You can separate birds at night one at a time to see who lays what - hopefully the eggs look different enough so that you can learn which days lays which egg (I find that mine are all a bit different - even though the eggs are white some are a bit creamy coloured or a slightly different size). Selecting for egg production is a bit of a long term project though as the father plays a role in determining how well the daughters lay. Initially you will have to use a drake maybe not knowing the laying potential of the females in his family background.

Keeping the offspring pure means separating them for a few weeks before collecting eggs to incubate. That's a bit of a pain, but if you do it you will be doing the breeds a favour and there will be greater demand for their offspring. Trying to select for egg production is a very good thing to do too.

 

[Oregon Blues]

If you want to sell ducklings, you'll find that it is easier with purebreds.

You don't really have any breeds that were developed as egg laying breeds.