Egg laying performance of white leghorn and their crosses with local birds at Debre Zeit, Ethiopia
1998
Mekonen Hailemariam (Ethiopian Agricultural Research Organization, Addis Abeba (Ethiopia))
Data collected between 1985 and 1991 on egg laying performance of local, White Leghorn (WLH) and their crossbred birds were analyzed with the primary objective of identifying the most productive breed group. Dairy egg production per bird (mean = 0.08) and percent hen-housed (mean = 6%) egg production was lowest in local birds and highest in WLH (0.43, 39%). The average mortality rate of laying hens was highest in local birds (7.1%) and lowest in WLH (2.6%) over the first 6 months of the laying period. There was no difference between breed groups in age at first laying and it ranged between 162 days (5/8 WLH-local crosses) to 172 days (pure WLH birds). Due to lack of adequate number of replicates per breed group, only the data of WLH and 5/8 WLH, 1/2 WLH and 1/4 WLH crosses were subjected to least squares analysis including breed group and year of hatching. The WLH birds were not different from their crosses in laying and survival ability. Among the crossbreeds, 1/4 WLH-local crosses were poor in their laying performance and survival ability. Based on hen-housed egg production over 12-months of laying period, a criterion that considered viability, egg laying performance and persistency of laying, the F sub(1) native-Leghorn crosses followed by WLH were found to be superior to all other genotypes.
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