The Domestic Duck by Chris and Mike Ashton

[CityChicker]

Has anyone else read this book? I am not even done reading it yet, but I absolutely *love* it. I am about half way through it plus skimming through some of the last part of the book. It is the best and most detailed book about domestic ducks that I have ever read.

All of the information about the individual breeds and their development alone makes this book well worth getting. I am so glad I bought it. So much about why certain breeds are similar or different is now making perfect sense.

Anyway, I highly recommend it! They just sent me a copy of their colour breeding book too that arrived yesterday and it looks great too. I can't wait to read it.

 

[CityChicker]

Also, I should mention- when I first heard about this book, just the hard cover (with the White Call on the front) came up in google and it is like $75.

I found and purchased the paperback version on Amazon (has Runners on the cover instead of the Call) for only $27. Here is the link if anyone is interested....

http://www.amazon.com/Domestic-Duck...=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1244220345&sr=1-3

 

[giffy]

Quote:
I purchased that one (Colour Breeding in Domestic Ducks) a while back........great read!

giffy
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[CityChicker]

Yeah, I am looking forward to reading that one too. It looks really interesting and both books have a lot of great photos. I wish I could get a copy of their Indian Runner book too. I may email them and see if they have any more copies.

The more in-depth book, The Domestic Duck, is just filled with great information. It was really interesting reading especially about certain breeds that have the same genotype and yet why they look so different. Fascinating stuff!

 

[Wifezilla]

Just curious...does it mention angel wing?

 

[Dances with Ducks]

I've got their color breeding book, beautiful photos. I learned some stuff regarding sex linking that I put together with what Holderread wrote that fascinated me. But when I was trying to figure out how to predict the colors of my runners I couldn't get anywhere using their chart. Not that that's what the chart was intended for from what I could tell. From what you say I think I would really enjoy their Domestic Duck book tho.

 

[CityChicker]

I think you would like the book, Dances with Ducks. I think on your Runner color issue, there is probably no way to really answer (at least not based on sex-linking). If I remember right you were trying to mate two colors both with brown dilution? One of the birds would have to be black or grey in order to mate to brown for sex linked mating if I remember correctly.

Okay, on the topic of Angel Wing, Wifezilla. I jumped ahead in the book to read those sections. They actually only have a couple of paragraphs on it. They basically say that it is a result of fast growing and that it is not genetic. They don't think it is genetic because pairs of birds only sporadically have an offspring that develops it and the ones that do are the individuals that are fast growers. They then refer back to the diet section for rearing ducklings.

So, in the diet for ducklings, they strongly recommend a duck starter which they say should be about 18% protein. They only recommend starter for the first two weeks at which point they suggest switching gradually to a 15% protein grower. They seem to be another breeder that does not like high protein saying that even the starter is too high of protein for more than two weeks. Whether this is valid or not, I don't know.

I think you are really on to something with what you say about ducks in parks getting Angel Wing. I think it could be any number of things. What can be said about ducks in parks and domestic ducks also is that they are relatively sedentary (compared to wild ducks) and that they can be overfed.

It really might be that Angel Wing is not about either protein or carbs necesarily. It could simply be overfeeding and lack of exercise (again, compared to wild ducks/geese). Who knows. I did see just yesterday that Metzer's also think it might be overfeeding. It does seem to almost always affect ducklings during that rapid growth phase between like 3-8 weeks.