Gachpara Kamarnaoga beel lies in Fazilhati union of Delduar upazila in Tangail. About a year ago Aminur Rahman bought 1,000 Jinding and Khaki Campbell ducklings for Tk 35,000 and set up a mobile duck farm on the beel's water.

After the first three to four months of rearing, the farm has been producing on average 300 to 350 eggs a day. Wholesalers buy them at the farm for Tk 1,100 per hundred (Tk 44 a hali). Selling 350 eggs a day, Aminur gets Tk 3,800.

His income from eggs is now Tk 1 lakh 15 thousand a month. For five months he has been collecting 350 eggs a day without a break, and at times, the report says, he has had 400 eggs a month from the farm.

The beel has now dried out completely and turned into cropland, where Boro rice will be planted in a few days. Even so, Aminur keeps his ducks on a mobile farm beside it. In the rainy season the fields turn back into a water body.

In winter most of the beel has dried up, leaving only patches of water. From a lean-to hut on a raised plot nearby, Aminur calls out "aay-aay" a few times, and about a thousand ducks scattered in the distance come one by one, quacking.

He calls the ducks mainly at feeding time. He has also made a place to sleep in one corner of the hut so he can guard them.

Through will, effort and tireless work, Aminur, who returned from abroad, now earns a lakh taka a month from the duck farm. The farm has changed his fortunes and given local people the inspiration to become self-reliant.

Aminur said that 10 or 12 years ago he traded wheat. He bought one duck a day from his daily profit, until he had 165 ducks, and understood even then that duck rearing paid.

For a long time he ran his household on the income from ducks and even raised the cost of going abroad from it. To earn more he went to Saudi Arabia, and after returning went to Singapore. Thinking he would earn more from ducks than abroad, he came home.

A few days later, about a year ago, he bought 1,000 Jinding and Khaki Campbell ducklings for Tk 35,000 and set up the mobile farm. He built a shed for the ducks at little cost. Because the farm is mobile, the ducks always stay on the water, which keeps feed costs down.

He said the farm sold Tk 5 lakh of eggs over the past four to five months, against costs of Tk 2 lakh. The ducks are still laying regularly. If the 1,000 ducks sell at Tk 400 each, they will fetch about Tk 4 lakh, all of which will be profit. By this reckoning, he said, he is earning more than a lakh a month.

Aminur Rahman added that if the water body held enough water, feed costs would fall and eggs would cost even less to produce. With the water receding, he has to keep the ducks at home for much of the time. Even so, he plans to bring 3,000 ducklings to the farm this year. He now earns more than he did abroad, and many neighbours, inspired, are thinking of starting farms.

Dr Mohammad Ali, veterinary surgeon at the Delduar upazila livestock office, said Aminur's duck farm is undoubtedly a good initiative. But to keep the ducks healthy, they must be given the routine vaccines and duck cholera vaccine on schedule. Vaccines, treatment and advice are provided at government-set prices.

Source: Online Desk. First published in Bengali on The Agro News.