Rescuer Find New Homes for 800 Abandoned Ducks

Regina Domenigoni is done distributing ducks.

The Winchester woman has given away all of the 800 domestic ducks she rescued from a poultry farm across the street, where more than 4,000 had died for lack of food and water.

“I even kept two for myself,” neighbor Phyllis Beals said Wednesday.

Domenigoni and her neighbors on Tuesday had trucked the ducks to her backyard to feed them and to find homes--permanent or otherwise--for the animals. Thanks to news coverage, all have now been taken.

Most of the ducks seemed destined for the oven, but some people took them to neighborhood ponds or to raise for their eggs.

The duck dilemma developed this year when An Bing Do rented a former chicken ranch to raise 5,000 ducks. But he ran out of money in June, according to a Riverside County Sheriff’s Department report. And by the time he told the property owners he could no longer care for the ducks, more than half had perished.

The property owners said they were trying to care for the remaining ducks, but Domenigoni took matters into her own hands Tuesday after hundreds more had died, and rescued the surviving 800.

The Sheriff’s Department has asked that animal cruelty charges be filed against Do, and the district attorney’s office is reviewing the case.