This Duck Lays 265 Eggs a Year AND Feeds Your Whole Family — Why Did Everyone Stop Raising It?

There is a duck breed out there whose own creator never lived to see it officially finished. He spent nearly two decades chasing one very specific goal, building the closest thing to a perfect all around farm duck that has ever existed, and he died before he could file the paperwork that would have made it official. For years afterward, the breed he built nearly slipped away entirely, kept alive by little more than memory and a handful of scattered birds, until one dedicated breeder decided it was worth rescuing. That is the real story behind the Silver Appleyard, and if you have made it through the first two videos in this series, you already know these hidden duck breeds tend to have better backstories than most people expect. This one might be the best of the three. The man behind this duck was named Reginald Appleyard, and he ran a place called Priory Waterfowl Farm near Ixworth, in Suffolk, England, starting in the 1930s. Appleyard was not a hobbyist dabbling in a side project. He was one of the most respected poultry breeders in England at the time, the same man who developed the Ixworth chicken, a breed still kept today for its own excellent meat qualities. But his real ambition was a duck, and the goal he set for himself was almost stubbornly specific. He wanted a bird with a wide, deep breast that would dress out beautifully for the table, skin that stayed clean and white rather than yellowing, plumage striking enough to win at exhibition, and on top of all of that, a duck that would still lay an abundant number of large white eggs. Most breeders would have picked one or two of those goals and called it a success. Appleyard refused to compromise on any of them.