By Katy Kinker

Indiana is the nation’s leader in duck production. According to the 2022 Census of Agriculture, more than 13 million ducks were sold in Indiana in 2022.

How does Indiana remain a leader? It is home to two major commercial duck producers, Maple Leaf Farms and Culver Duck.

Maple Leaf Farms of Leesburg, Ind., is a large contributor to that ranking. The operation sells duck to domestic and international markets. Although it doesn’t produce duck eggs for consumption, it provides breeding stock to duck companies in other regions of the world. This enables production and consumption in other global markets.

The company is on top of biosecurity protocols and cutting-edge feed, air and ventilation practices, says Cesar Chavez, director of technical services in live production at Maple Leaf Farms.

With the duck industry constantly evolving, Maple Leaf Farms is proactively addressing changes through research.

“On the production side of the business, we are continually researching better ways of caring for ducks,” Chavez says. “Our company also focuses on producing innovative, value-added duck products that make it easier for home cooks and restaurant operators to prepare and serve duck.”

While Maple Leaf Farms conducts some of its own research, Purdue University is working through a variety of duck research projects. Here is a glimpse at some of the studies taking place:

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Lighting management and egg production

Duck egg production is closely tied to the length of daylight. Longer days stimulate egg production, making sunlight or artificial lighting a crucial factor in maintaining a steady supply of eggs. Shorter day lengths will ultimately affect the quality of the eggs produced.

“An insufficient lighting period is generally more concerning than a longer lighting period,” Chavez says. “When natural light is not sufficient to meet the physiological and behavioral needs of the ducks, then artificial lighting is provided so the ducks can normally eat, drink, investigate their surroundings and stimulate activity with other ducks.”

Ultimately, if hens do not get at least 14 hours of light, they could stop producing eggs. On the other hand, if ducks are not given a scotophase, or “nighttime,” production is negatively affected. Egg quality declines even though number of eggs increases. Although duck eggs aren’t largely sold for consumption in Indiana, they play a crucial role in the regeneration of duck populations.

“If we want that egg laid every day, we have to keep them on a long day length,” says Gregory S. Fraley, Terry and Sandra Tucker Endowed Chair of Poultry Science at Purdue. “‘Long’ technically means anything over 12 hours to 14 hours. That long day length also helps maximize growth for our meat birds, and it's just generally better for the industry.”

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Fraley’s research lab in the animal sciences department focuses on how the changes in a bird’s environment affects its brain pathways, which alter its physiology and behavior. Lighting is just one component of that research.

“There have been a lot of assumptions made about lighting,” Fraley adds. “Essentially, most lighting systems and barns were designed to benefit the people working in the barns, with very little thought put into what the birds are seeing. We're working with a lot of other people to try to understand how birds can see and how they perceive objects or resources in their environment.”

Hard to understand

Birds in general have four different color receptors called cones, and the number is dependent on the species. They also have something called a double cone, but researchers are not sure what its purpose is.

In addition to the cones, birds have an organelle that mammals don’t have called an oil droplet, which filters the light before it gets into the photoreceptor. Different photoreceptors will have different types of these filters. All these organelles and structures allow ducks to see more colors than humans can see.

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HOLISTIC APPROACH: When studying poultry, Gregory S. Fraley, the Terry and Sandra Tucker Endowed Chair of Poultry Science at Purdue, and his research lab take a multifaceted approach. This means they examine the entire bird. Their research includes analyzing behavior, taking various measurements of the animal and more, rather than focusing on isolated parts of the bird.

“There is nothing in our experience that can allow us to understand how a bird perceives its environment,” Fraley says. “Their vision is anatomically completely different than ours, and it is processed in their brain differently than ours. They even have these entire optic lobes of their brains that are just for processing vision.”

Research has shown that they are particularly sensitive to pure blue light, often reacting negatively to it. This insight can play a vital role in preventing the spread of avian influenza. By installing blue lights around poultry barns at night, wild birds can be deterred from approaching, significantly reducing the risk of disease transmission.

Pekin duck vocalizations

When you walk into a barn, you hear all different kinds of “quacks,” and Purdue researchers have found that ducks make 16 distinctively different vocalizations.

“Everyone thinks a duck goes ‘quack,’ and that’s pretty much it,” Fraley says. “I’ve noticed for many years that I’ve spent in barns that I hear many different types of vocalizations. I have always wondered what they are saying to each other or why they are making the different vocalizations.”

Fraley and Jenna Schober, a Ph.D. candidate in his research lab, collaborated with Jeffrey Lucas, a professor of biological sciences, to create a repertoire of vocalizations.

The calls are dependent on sex of the bird, sex of the birds around them, number of ducks and stimuli, Schober says.

The next step in their research is to understand what each vocalization means.

Open water in commercial duck operations

Should commercial ducks have access to open water? Purdue researchers are evaluating this idea in collaboration with Drew Frey and Heidi Parnin at Culver Duck in Middlebury, Ind.  

In the wild, ducks naturally spend much of their time floating on ponds, lakes and other bodies of water. These natural ecosystems not only provide a habitat but also play a crucial role in breaking down duck waste through biological processes. Attempting to re-create such an environment in a barn housing thousands of ducks poses significant challenges.

Unlike natural water bodies, commercial operations lack the self-sustaining ecosystems needed to manage waste effectively. Allowing ducks access to open water in these settings would lead to the rapid accumulation of waste, creating an environment ripe for the spread of disease. It introduces practical risks that must be carefully considered in large-scale duck farming.

However, researchers at Purdue are actively exploring ways to provide environmental enrichment, aiming to improve duck welfare without compromising biosecurity or operational efficiency.

“We looked at having semi-open water sources, so ducks can dunk their head in the water but can’t climb into it,” Schober says. “They’re still able to perform natural wet preening behaviors.”

Kinker is a senior in agricultural communication at Purdue.