[mentalmilly]

Yes plucking ducks need a lot of patience and good company, a radio helps. It is worth doing for the meat and l have part skinned one, trouble is you lose some flavour without the skin l have found.  Not got round to trying the boiling water method yet, thats for next time.  Sound like muscovy is a favourite with a lot of us.

[MAK]

You must try the boiled water technique. You will not have time to tune the radio in before plucking a muscovey this time of year.

[northfifeduckling]

i love skin on or all the goodness goes 

[artscott]

We have found the scalding before plucking works well but with ducks and geese being water birds the feathers repel most of the water.  So I add a small squirt of washing up liquid in my boiling water helps to get the feathers water wet.
We normally scald chickens at approx 65 deg C for about a minute, Ducks at about 75 deg C for 1-3 minutes but pull out two or three times to check how the feathers pull out.
Having said that a dry pluck gives you a much nicer finished bird, the skin is better and less tough but it takes more time.  So it depends if you are doing a lot or just one at a time.

[graham-j]

Hi,do you hang your ducks/geese at all before plucking/gutting.

Graham.

[MAK]

No .
I do one at a time and we eat or freeze it the next day after a night in the fridge ( the duck that is). I can not imagine the taste improving any more than what we eat already. Fantastic muscovies  !
Thinking of doing a version of the dish on Masterchef. Confit of legs in chinese five spice garlic etc then take the meat to make a ballantine. Slice it , breadcrumb and deep fry and serve with pan fried pink duck breast in a sweet chinese sauce of some kind (with chips and mushy peas ? !!).