Duck season

It’s a challenging and busy time at Mount Gnomon. The days are gloomy and recent rains have made a pair of gumboots an essential item for feeding the menagerie.

But spring feels like it’s not too far away: we have only a couple of ewes left to lamb and we’ve had our first Belted Galloway calf.

The biggest indicator that the days are drawing out and the weather is going to improve is the onset of duck season. I don’t mean the shooting variety - I’m referring to the time when our large flock of ducks begins to lay.

I’ve long had a passion for ducks: it was my responsibility as a child to be the duck herder. Every night I’d call our Khaki Campbells with “dill, dill, dill” and they’d come in for their feed, and I’d shut them up so I could collect the eggs in the morning before the crows got them.

Eliza also grew up with ducks, and proudly tells of the time she took hand-reared Jimmy to the North Motton Pet Show on a lead.

The first ducks we bought for Mount Gnomon Farm were Indian Runners. Tall, upright, and elegant, the Indian Runners are great foragers and have earned a reputation for being the ideal garden slug and pest eradicator. The colours we have in our Indian Runners are classified as rare - in fact any colour other than white and white-and- fawn are rare and need support.

We have cinnamon, fawn, apricot, mallard, blue fawn, trout, and harlequin, and as a collection they make a great spectacle.

Indian runners have more of a herd mentality than any other duck and while they’re a bit scatty, they’re easy to train to go into their house at night. About an hour before dusk they run as a group to the shed entrance and wait to be shut up, away from our healthy population of quolls and devils.

The safety of the shed also protects the eggs from being pinched by crows each morning. Indian Runners are prolific layers and if fed a good laying ration can rival most chooks with their egg-laying capacity, often producing over 200 eggs in a season.

We have about 24 Indian Runner hens and when they all start laying it’s quite possible we’ll have to find a home for over 12 dozen eggs a week. We’re not sure what the market is like for ducks eggs, but we’re soon to find out.

Duck eggs are quite different to chook eggs. The yolk contains more fat and the white is higher in protein, and as a result if they’re eaten like a chook egg many people find them too rich. With their high protein levels they also require gentler cooking. However, the protein makes them perfect for baking and you can freely substitute chook eggs for duck eggs in cakes, biscuits, custards etc.

The high protein levels also mean that the whites will whip up better, so your cakes should be lighter and higher (and the richness of the egg yolks makes the cakes even richer).

Due to the relative scarcity of duck eggs most people haven’t cooked with them or are hesitant to give them a go. We’ve been told we’ll have to find some older country-style chefs that learnt to bake at a time when duck eggs were more common.

We would love to hear from people who have a particular use for duck eggs, or a favourite duck egg recipe, or know of someone who is after a regular supply. If not, our pigs can look forward to some special duck egg treats.