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December 15, 2014

Comparing the Nutrients of Duck Eggs and Chicken Eggs

People often ask how duck eggs compare nutritionally to chicken eggs.  Basically, duck eggs are packed with more nutrients than chicken eggs.  The only major nutrient that chicken eggs have more of than duck eggs is ..... water! 

Following is information taken from the USDA analysis of duck eggs and chicken eggs.  Note that these numbers represent the nutrient level in 100 grams of egg.


Of the ten major minerals, duck eggs surpass chicken eggs in nine of those minerals.  Overall, duck eggs average 10% more minerals than chicken eggs.


For the top 13 vitamins, duck eggs have higher levels in ten of them.  If you compare all thirteen vitamins, duck eggs average 40% more vitamins - and that does not even count carotene of which chicken eggs have none.


Duck eggs have a higher overall protein level and surpass chicken eggs in eleven of the eighteen measured amino acids.


Duck eggs also have a higher fat content - which gives them their rich flavor and texture.  It is interesting that duck eggs have 18% more of the saturated ("bad") fats than chicken eggs.  But they also have 39% more of the unsaturated ("good") fats! 


November 28, 2014

Fresh Duck Egg Survey Results

As explained in our prior post, we emailed a survey on fresh duck eggs to 93 of our customers that had purchased ten or more female Khaki Campbell, Golden 300 Hybrid or White Layer ducks.  The response rate was fantastic as we received 89 completed surveys! 

We felt the most important question in the survey was what services and products our customers wanted that would help them produce and sell more fresh duck eggs.  We gave them twelve choices and they ranked them from most important to least important.  More detailed descriptions of these questions was in our prior post.  In the following graph, the longer the bar, the higher average ranking it received.

Services Our Customers Want So They Can Produce and Market More Duck Eggs

Items in the Other category were requests on how to keep the pens drier, how to manage ducks on pasture, provide sample advertising, conduct a survey of pricing, and explain why duck eggs cause fewer allergic reactions than chicken eggs.

As we develop answers or products to meet these needs, we will provide them in this blog.  We are also developing an email list of those interested in the production, marketing and use of fresh duck eggs.  We hope to involve these people in our fresh duck egg program.  We may ask for their favorite duck egg recipes and quotes from chefs or bakers to whom they sell so we can produce a marketing brochure everyone can use.  Or we may ask for comments on a redesigned duck egg carton.  Or we may conduct another survey on pricing so those just starting in the business know what others in the nation are charging for duck eggs.  If you want to be included in this group, please email us at metzer@metzerfarms.com 

The following chart shows where our customers sell their duck eggs.  With duck egg brochures, recipes and marketing ideas, I would suspect more will start selling to bakeries, restaurants and grocery stores.

Where Our Customers Sell Their Duck Eggs 

We were also interested in the flock sizes of those responding to the survey.  As you can see, most of have flocks of from 11 to 100 females.

Flock Size for Survey Respondents

Our last question was their prediction of sales for next year.  The number on the left is the number of respondents for each category.  Over 60% of the respondents predicted sales increases of 10% or more. If you weight the responses according to their flock size, the overall prediction is an increase of 12.3% in sales next year.


Responders were given five choices for next year's sales forecast

Many duck eggs are also sold in Asian stores as balut and salted eggs.  Less than 5% of our respondents sold balut and salted eggs.

As we said earlier, we feel there is a tremendous potential for fresh duck egg sales.  Now that we know what our customers need, we will start working on these services so our customers can meet this market demand.

November 19, 2014

Fresh Duck Egg Survey

We feel there is a tremendous potential for fresh duck egg sales throughout the United States.  Our sales of fresh duck eggs are growing both locally through Farmers Markets and the eggs we ship throughout the country.  In addition, we sell more and more of our egg laying strains of ducklings throughout North America: Golden 300 Hybrid, White Layer and Khaki Campbell.


A Pair of Khaki Campbell ducks

We want to promote these sales but did not know what was most important to our customers.  So we designed a survey.  It was sent to all customers that purchased 10 or more females of one of the breeds listed above within the past two years.

I will describe our questions in this blog and give the results in our next blog. 

The first question was the most important.  It listed twelve services or products we can provide and asked them to rank these in importance to them.

Nutritional Data On Duck Versus Chicken Eggs  This would compare the levels of vitamins, minerals, fatty acids, lipids, etc. in chicken and duck eggs.

Duck Layer Management Guide  We would write a management guide describing how to maximize your duck egg production.

Our management guide for raising ducks for meat.


Fresh Duck Egg Brochure  We would design and print a brochure that would be used to promote your eggs - whether you sell at farmers markets, grocery stores, bakeries or restaurants.  It would have pictures, nutritional information and testimonials of chefs and bakers.  These would be provided at our cost.

Recipes Using Duck Eggs  These would be recipes we have collected or have had developed by chefs or cooking schools to use with duck eggs.



Duck Egg Cartons  We would find sources of egg cartons that hold the larger duck eggs.

Jumbo duck eggs in the largest egg carton available.
Medium duck eggs in the same carton.  No cartons are available that hold Large or Jumbo duck eggs.


Improved Genetics So The Ducks Lay More Eggs   We would work with a poultry geneticist to gradually improve egg production.

University Research  We would work with a university to determine how duck eggs are better than chicken eggs for baking and general cooking - facts not just opinions.

Egg Production Forecasting Tool   We would develop an egg production forecasting program for our website that would give you expected weekly egg production if you entered your flock sizes, breeds and starting dates for each flock.  What would your production be if you had a flock starting every six months or smaller flocks every three months?  If you have a peak demand during the summer, when do you start your flocks and how many ducks should be in each flock?

This shows the weekly fresh duck egg and duckling production if you started 1000 White Layer females in production every two months.


Improved Genetics So The Ducks Lay Larger Eggs   We would work with a poultry geneticist to increase the egg size.

Internet Duck Egg Chat Group   This would be set up exclusively for individuals that produce and sell fresh duck eggs.  You would be able to ask questions and share solutions to problems with other fresh duck egg producers.

Duck Egg Washing Machines   We would list sources of duck egg washers and compare their effectiveness and costs.

We also asked where they sold their eggs:
  On the farm
  Farmers Markets
  Bakeries
  Restaurants
  Delivery Route
  Grocery Stores
  Internet
  Wholesalers that buy from me and resell
  Asian Stores (fresh eggs)

In addition we asked how many ducks they had laying this year and how much they expected their sales to increase next year.

The final question was if they also sold balut (partially incubated duck eggs) or salted duck eggs.

Please check our next blog for the results.