Talk:Aylesbury duck

Question

How long do aylesbury ducks live for?

In theory, around 10 years. However, there's no such thing as a wild Aylesbury duck, and commercially raised ducks are generally slaughtered a couple of months after hatching. – iridescent 09:38, 27 October 2010 (UTC)

"Shoeing"

I've removed one uncited fact from the article about the ducks being "shod" with a solution of pitch and sawdust and made to walk from Aylesbury to London. I would love this to be true, and I know Aylesbury Council's website claims this, but I can't find any reliable source at all for it. While Daniel Defoe talks about this being done with Norfolk turkeys, and it seems to have occasionally also to have been done with geese, I can't find any contemporary mention, or any mention in any "history of poultry" book, of this ever being done with ducks. Since the whole point of the elaborate arrangements for rearing Aylesbury ducks was to keep the ducklings out of sunlight to keep the feathers white, and prevent them getting exercise to keep the flesh tender, a 40-mile forced march over the Chilterns would seem to spoil the point. – iridescent 09:42, 27 October 2010 (UTC)

I'll have a look at the CBS when I'm in there at the weekend, and see if there's a mention in a reliable source there. -- role^player 22:47, 27 October 2010 (UTC)

I have several books on the history of Aylesbury (it being where I live) and I have found two references that state that Aylesbury ducks were first bred here to be sold on the London market, but no mention is made in either of them how the ducks got there. I have reproduced the relevant paragraphs here for you, to be included in the article somewhere (if required):

Seabright, Colin J. (2006). Aylesbury. Stroud: Tempus. p. 32-33. ISBN 9780752446479.

The Aylesbury Duck is a distinct breed, always white with a pale pink beak and orange feet. Its offspring grow rapidly, reaching table-ready size in about eight weeks, and were highly regarded by Mrs Beeton. For most of the nineteenth century vast quantities were bred locally for the London market, many by small breeders as a second occupation. To get them through their first few weeks, the delicate ducklings were handreared in the homes of their owners, shared their living and bedrooms and [were] later allowed out to paddle in the nearest available pond or stream. [Accompanying photograph] Pictured around 1900, ducks from several local broods swim happily together on Walton Pond.

Many of the small-scale duck breeders lived in the area of White Hill and the Oxford Road, which became known locally as Duck End. In the twentieth century the small duckbreeders in the town slowly gave up, though ducks were still to be found in surrounding villages, particularly in Weston Turville. A few larger duck farms survived, though the last of these closed in the late fifties.

Birch, Clive (1975). The Book of Aylesbury. Chesham: Barracuda. p. 85. ISBN 086023004X.

Meanwhile, smallholding was growing in one speciality - the Aylesbury duck. Proximity to the London market, and perhaps an accident of breeding provided the succulent young Aylesbury or white ducklings which could be got to town quickly. Walton became a centre for local output, and there are those who can recall the four separate flocks that congregated on Walton Pond, dividing to go their separate ways to the home farms at feeding time.

In 1921 the Aylesbury duckling trade was a speculative one. The birds matured quickly, large as a breed. The Easter market was important and to produce 1,000 birds for the table, a breeder would need 30-40 stock ducks. Food comprised egg, bread, bullock's liver, rice, boiled offal, barley meal and grit. The Aylesbury duckling was prone to disease, and put to market at 8-12 weeks. Carriers called fortnightly. The birds fetched from 6 to 10s each. Fouled ground and feed prices finally eliminated the major profits in the '20s and the Aylesbury duckling went the way of the lace-makers.

Hope this helps. Note: Walton Pond refers to Walton, Aylesbury. The lace-makers refers to Bucks point lace, another huge local industry in Aylesbury in the 19th century. -- role^player 23:48, 27 October 2010 (UTC)

Those are the ones I've found as well (I went with the Bucks County Museum's book as the source for their origins; it says the same thing, but is probably more useful as a book for anyone who wants to investigate them further). The fact that no book actually about Aylesbury (that I can find) mentions this practice—and it's such an unusual practice, one would think someone would mention it—makes me think that Aylesbury Council made a mistake when they mentioned it on their website, and other people have since copied that. As I say above, I can find contemporary mentions of this being done with turkeys in Norfolk, but a turkey is a lot bigger and stronger than a duckling (and Norfolk is a lot flatter). – iridescent 09:43, 28 October 2010 (UTC)

As I say I'll have a look at the CBS at the weekend. -- role^player 09:46, 28 October 2010 (UTC)

Recent edit

Sorry about that, I have never worked on a featured article candidate so have no idea what they should look like. I've found some more references to the legacy that the Aylesbury duck has had on the local aea, and wanted to include them without that section becoming completely slapshod. I'll just add my bits here and you can put them into the main article however you see fit.

• There's a pub in Aston Clinton called The Duck In, which features on its pubs sign the Aylesbury duck. However it doesn't appear to have a website that shows this so short of me going out and taking a photo of the sign I'm not sure how to include it.
• Aylesbury Rugby Football Club also feature the duck on thier club badge, website: http://www.arfcuk.org/
• I've taken a photo of the brewey company livery on the front wall of the Britannia pub in Aylesbury, though don't know how to upload photos on Wikipedia - the copyright issues are largely putting me off from uploading it
• I went to the CBS and looked at all the books they have there for any mention of the ducks being walked into London and none of them do; it therefore appears that that bit is a bit of a myth picked up from somewhere. One of the books you have already used is Alison Ambrose: in that book on page 23 she does talk about how in 1750 the breeders would walk into London with the ducks in carts: perhaps that is where the misunderstanding came from?
• I have found a reference that goes into the earliest date that duck breeding is found in Aylesbury as the 1690s, it's Hugh Hanley's 2009 book, "Aylesbury, a History". Chichester: Phillimore. ISBN 9781870664966. Page 48.

-- role^player 12:35, 30 October 2010 (UTC)

Thanks—will work the 1690 date in. Regarding the various duck-themed things, I think it might be overkill to list all of them; as you know, Aylesbury is full of duck-related things. I've mentioned Aylesbury United because I know that people really do call them "the ducks" in general conversation, in the same way Norwich are "the canaries"; I'm not sure that's the case with the rugby team (although I'm not familiar with them).

Local Colour

There is yet another pub to the north of Aylesbury called The Aylesbury Duck, and this was the cause of a local scandal when the pub sign was initially painted as a Mallard (more colourful, but not an Aylesbury duck). In a vain attempt to appease the body was repainted white, but the bill was still yellow and this created the portrait of a Pekin duck instead! Finally the bill was repainted to the regulation 'flesh colour' (according to old documents) and peace was restored.

Old Aylesburian (talk) 07:37, 3 November 2010 (UTC)

I was trying to avoid turning into a list of all the duck-related things in Aylesbury, just because there are so many. (Unless someone is particularly interested in canals or condensed milk, they're the only thing most people associate with Aylesbury.) I suspect (albeit with no evidence) that if one went back further, back in the 19th century probably every other pub in central Bucks was called "The Duck", given how iconic they were. – iridescent 17:26, 5 November 2010 (UTC)

Photos

Shame there are no photos of Aylesbury ducks. Any reason why? They would illustrate the subject much better than that old black and white engraving. 86.159.193.103 (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 08:23, 3 November 2010 (UTC).

The reason why is simple; there's only one flock of the things in the UK, and that's on private land. That said, even if we had a wonderful quality photo, I'd still argue for the 1873 engraving as the lead image. That image is there for a reason; 1873 was the year Pekin ducks were introduced to Britain and, as well as cross-breeding with native strains, influenced peoples' idea of what a duck "ought to look like", and hence the breed standard—thus, 1873 was the last year of the pure Aylesbury duck, and prize-winning ducks of that year (which those are) represent the closest to a perfection of the idealised breed strain. – iridescent 17:02, 5 November 2010 (UTC)

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WP:URFA/2020

Iridescent I have one query before marking this "Satisfactory" at URFA:

• Is anything here usable?
• This indicates different weight data than in the article.

SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:17, 30 November 2021 (UTC)

The first link seems to all be old sources, which I'm reluctant to use except for historical context (which I think is already well-covered). The second gives me a "no preview available"—Google Books is very tightly geographically restricted—but I'd be inclined to stick with the current "six to ten pounds" rather than the "over ten pounds" I see in snippet view. (This is an American source, and the US allows a lot of farming practices which are banned in the rest of the world. Without being able to access the source this is pure OR, but my guess is that the "over 10 pounds" reflects US conditions of battery-rearing and hormone supplements, whereas "6–10 pounds" reflects what they grow to under the conditions of a British farm where the fowl are able to exercise and are eating a more grain-based diet without growth hormone supplements. Certainly, one sees the same disparity between US and UK livestock when it comes to chicken.) On this particular topic, when British and US sources disagree I'd always go with the British sources since it's clearly a primarily UK topic. ‑ Iridescent 07:52, 3 December 2021 (UTC)

Got it, thanks Iri, marking Satisfactory then. Bst, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 13:46, 3 December 2021 (UTC)