🦆 Muscovy
Ducks · breed reference
A DIFFERENT SPECIES — Cairina moschata, from South America, where every other duck here is a bred-up Mallard. It follows from that: eggs take 35 DAYS not 28; a cross with any other duck gives a sterile Moulard; it does not quack at all (drakes hiss, ducks trill); it PERCHES and roosts in trees on real claws and flies well enough to leave. Also the best broody in poultry, an obsessive fly and slug eater, and a lean, un-greasy carcass. The drake is nearly twice the duck — the widest sex difference in poultry, and worth knowing before you budget freezer space. NOT Russian — the name has nothing to do with Moscow. LEGAL: a US rule since 2010 puts Muscovy under migratory-bird protection because a wild population reaches south Texas; keeping them for food production is expressly provided for, but releasing captive birds to the wild is not, and feral flocks in Florida and Texas are managed as a nuisance. Check your state and city.
| Species | Duck |
|---|---|
| Kept for | Both |
| Eggs per year | ~100 |
| First eggs | ~28 weeks |
| Table-ready | ~14 weeks |