It's All Just Ducky

Lovin' those ducks!

Morning Owl Farm has been raising free-rangin', pasture grazin' ducks since we started growing food in 2004. In five summer seasons, we've gone from six layer hens to nearly 300 so that we now sell between 60-100 dozen eggs each week.

Our girls (and a few boys) are cooped at night to protect them from predators and provide them a sense of safety--something very important to ducks. In the morning, they're let loose for what we call "the running of the ducks" to roam semi-freely (behind electric netting--again, the predators), munch weeds, grass and "protein sources" (bugs and such), swim, drink, flap, quack, and generally act like ducks.

Once they're out and about, we collect the eggs, which are washed, sanitized, packed and refrigerated immediately. For those wondering how you wash so many eggs, you just do. There's no equipment designed for an operation of our size; everything is for the egg factories or for the home egg producer. We've developed a procedure we think is pretty safe, based on consultation with department of ag folks in three states. Here's how we do it:

1. Fill a sink or basin with the hottest tap water (ours is from one of our three wells) and gets to 128.5 degrees. As the water is filling, add a drop of one of the natural, unscented dish washing liquids. We use Planet or Seventh Generation, whichever is on sale when we need it.

2. Add 12-15 eggs (less if eggs are very dirty, more is they're very clean). The thing to realize is that you don't want your eggs to sit in water for more than 120 seconds. So time yourself and see how fast you can clean your eggs. The eggs won't turn into pumpkins at two minutes, but the longer the eggs are in water, the greater is the risk they'll absorb bacteria--bacteria it should be mentioned, that will be killed if the eggs are cooked correctly. Regardless, wash fast! And to wash the eggs, use either a rag or a scrubbie, one of those things with an abrasive side and a sponge side. This takes off all of the visible markings from the laying process.

3. We set aside three batches, or 60 eggs. When the 60th egg is clean, we draw a bath now of cold water and a little bit of chlorinated bleach--a very little bit. Get testing strips until you figure out how much bleach and water are needed to get to 100-200 ppm.

4. Set 20 eggs in the bath for no more than 30 seconds. Basically, put them in and take them out. Set them on a drying rack or towel to dry.

5. Candle the eggs when dry to find blood spots and cracks. Blood spots are not uncommon when layers are starting to lay, but they're the exception not the rule. Still, if you're selling eggs, do your best to be sure they don't leave your farm.

6. Place in clean cartons. We have reused cartons that we know were taken care of, but if I'm not sure, 100% sure, I use a new carton. I never reuse cartons from small flock owners, for instance, because I'm not sure that they didn't put dirty eggs in the cartons. Cartons are cheap and you can reuse old cartons for things like "dog eggs," eggs too big or too small to sell or eggs with slight cracks that can be boiled and fed to your dogs.

6. We save all of the shells from culled eggs, heat them to dry them and feed them back to the hens. Given a choice of oyster shell or their own dried eggs, the hens will choose their own eggs for their source of calcium.

Our method isn't for everyone. The USDA doesn't like you to immerse eggs in water at all, but the USDA is regulating egg factories, not farmers like us who take precautions and who are using methods for our scale operation that have been used since farmers started collecting and selling eggs. More on egg factories later , time for breakfast!

If you want our delicious duck eggs, they're available at our stand during the summer months and always at Atkinson's Market in Ketchum and at the Boise Co-Op. We're very proud, too, to report that our eggs are served at Red Feather in downtown Boise, at Brick 29 Bistro in Nampa and at sixonesix in Eagle.