Augmenting the Family Income: Integrated fish-duck farming

The moment Celso Galang, a rice farmer in the remote barangay of Habingan in Atimonan, Quezon Province, got hold of some reading materials on integrated fish-duck farming, he was hooked on the idea. The integrated systems is being propagated by the Department of Agriculture’s Bureau of Animal Industry (BAI) and Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources (BFAR) and the NGO Mindanao Baptist Rural Life Center operating in Kinuskusan, Bansalan, Davao del Sur. It was an enterprise, he thought, that matches well with the abundant supply of irrigation water from a mountain spring cascading down a creek into his rice fields.

He dug out a 70-square meter fishpond near the irrigation canal and on one side over it he constructed a duck house with a floor made of wooden slats (bamboo slats can be used, too). The floor are of 12 sq. m. houses 50 fowls (six males and 44 females). Below it, he put snails in the fishpond with which to feed the ducks for toughening the egg shells.

Celso, who is assisted by his wife Aurora and their two children of high school age, chose Khaki Campbell for his flock of ducks. Originally from England and introduced to the Philippines by BAI, Khaki Campbell is a cross among the Fawn and White Runner, the Roven and the Mallard ducks.

According to the farmer, this breed is a good layer, yielding as many as 300 eggs per laying year. The eggs which are fairly large, thick-shelled and weigh about 70-75 grams are excellent for balut, penoy, itlog na maalat and century eggs. Other excellent layers are the native Pateros duck (itik), Indian Runner and Cherry Valley 2000. For those who prefer good meat producers, there area Muscovy and Pekin ducks.

Celso‘s flock are fed with a ration of 1/3 snails gathered from the fishpond, 1/3 rice bran and 1/3 palay (unhulled rice) or broken corn bits. For feed supplements, the ducks are given green leaves of kangkong, cassava and other leguminous cover plants.

For the stocking of fish, Celso prefers tilapia nilotica which grows fast and starts breeding in five months. Ideal stocking ratio is two to three per square meter but he has only 100 or more pieces in his 70-square meters of fishpond.

The tilapia feed on algae plants (scums, kelps and weeds) which grow on the pond. To keep the plants always lush and growing, the pond is fertilized with pig dung, duck manure, chicken droppings, green leaves and cut crasses at a ratio of five kilos for every square meter. For the golden apple snails, which are essential to the diet of the ducks for tough-shelled eggs, they are given kangkong and azolla. Duckweeds, hydrillas, water hyacinths, grasses, camote tops, vegetable scraps, as well as papaya and taro leaves.

On the average, the family’s duck layers produce 11,000 eggs (44 layers multiplied by an estimated 250 eggs) a year. At a wholesale price of P3 per piece, egg production gives the family some P30,000 yearly, more than enough for the schooling of the couple’s two children. The earnings from their tilapia producer cover capital outlay and home consumption together with some duck eggs. Buyers of their duck eggs are makers of balut, penoy, salted eggs and century eggs. Some are sold to middlemen. Tilapia harvests go to the tiangge, ambulant fish vendors and neighboring communities.

The family of Celso Galang is one example of Filipino determination, industry and entrepreneurial savvy, qualities which are not a monopoly of the experts in the big city.