Thought I would start a thread to chronicle my journey with attempting to raise rice and ducks together. I've looked but didn't find any other threads specifically about this topic. The idea behind rice duck farming is that the ducks will eat mosquito larvae and other pests out of the rice pond, while also fertilizing the rice. This provides a benefit to the rice and the ducks since the ducks are finding food and the rice is fertilized and protected from pests.
So, to start I will say this is my first year attempting either. My first year raising ducks and my first year trying to grow rice.
I'm in North Carolina, zone 7b. I started with 3 types of seeds which I ordered from Southern Exposure Seed Exchange. The varieties I got were Hmong sticky rice, Carolina Gold, and one called M-101.
Some things I've learned so far:
-This probably would work better if I had gotten smaller breeds of ducks. I have 2 Swedish Blue, 1 Cayuga and 1 Pekin. They are 5 weeks old now and I'm quickly realizing they are likely to squish a fair amount of rice plants. It might have been better to go with call ducks or another smaller breed.
-I started the Hmong sticky rice seeds outside in the kiddie pool, and the Carolina gold and M-101 seeds indoors, with the intention of building a larger pond for them and transplanting them into it. The rice grown outside is so much stronger! Honestly I'm not sure the seeds I started indoors will grow to maturity. They were too sheltered from wind and rain and now that I've moved them outside they won't stay up straight. The plants flop right over and trying to transplant them into a larger pond at this point would probably be a wasted effort. I think I will have to try those two types of rice again next year and just focus on the Hmong sticky rice this year.
-Straight garden soil is not heavy enough for use in a flooded garden bed. The soil is very easily disturbed and the roots do not have a solid grip in it. I'll be adding a fair bit of red clay from my back yard to create a heavier, thicker soil that will hopefully be less easily disturbed.
-The ducks highly prefer the messy muddy rice pool to their clean kiddie pool. When the rice plants were very small I had to keep them out of it and that wasn't an easy task! After spending time in the rice pool though they like to run to the clean pool and wash off. Ideally the ducks wouldn't go into the rice pond until the rice is a foot tall, but we have had too many mosquitoes lately so I'm not going to wait that long.
-Since the soil is so loose, after the ducks get out I often have to push the roots back down into the soil for a large percentage of the plants. This would be a pain on a larger scale. I'm hopeful that amending the soil will solve this issue.
Photo of the Hmong sticky rice, which I'm guessing will be the only kind I get a crop from this year:
So, to start I will say this is my first year attempting either. My first year raising ducks and my first year trying to grow rice.
I'm in North Carolina, zone 7b. I started with 3 types of seeds which I ordered from Southern Exposure Seed Exchange. The varieties I got were Hmong sticky rice, Carolina Gold, and one called M-101.
Some things I've learned so far:
-This probably would work better if I had gotten smaller breeds of ducks. I have 2 Swedish Blue, 1 Cayuga and 1 Pekin. They are 5 weeks old now and I'm quickly realizing they are likely to squish a fair amount of rice plants. It might have been better to go with call ducks or another smaller breed.
-I started the Hmong sticky rice seeds outside in the kiddie pool, and the Carolina gold and M-101 seeds indoors, with the intention of building a larger pond for them and transplanting them into it. The rice grown outside is so much stronger! Honestly I'm not sure the seeds I started indoors will grow to maturity. They were too sheltered from wind and rain and now that I've moved them outside they won't stay up straight. The plants flop right over and trying to transplant them into a larger pond at this point would probably be a wasted effort. I think I will have to try those two types of rice again next year and just focus on the Hmong sticky rice this year.
-Straight garden soil is not heavy enough for use in a flooded garden bed. The soil is very easily disturbed and the roots do not have a solid grip in it. I'll be adding a fair bit of red clay from my back yard to create a heavier, thicker soil that will hopefully be less easily disturbed.
-The ducks highly prefer the messy muddy rice pool to their clean kiddie pool. When the rice plants were very small I had to keep them out of it and that wasn't an easy task! After spending time in the rice pool though they like to run to the clean pool and wash off. Ideally the ducks wouldn't go into the rice pond until the rice is a foot tall, but we have had too many mosquitoes lately so I'm not going to wait that long.
-Since the soil is so loose, after the ducks get out I often have to push the roots back down into the soil for a large percentage of the plants. This would be a pain on a larger scale. I'm hopeful that amending the soil will solve this issue.
Photo of the Hmong sticky rice, which I'm guessing will be the only kind I get a crop from this year:
she's only 5½ weeks old! 
