Growth performance and survival of Local and White Leghorn chickens under scavenging and intensive systems of management in Ethiopia 

Solomon  Demeke

Jimma College of Agriculture. PO Box 307, Jimma, Ethiopia
jcolagri@telecom.net.et 

Abstract 

This experiment was conducted to evaluate the comparative growth performance of Local and White Leghorn chickens under intensive and scavenging conditions with or without supplementation. Replicated groups of Local and White Leghorn baby chickens were subjected to scavenging, scavenging plus supplementation, and intensive feeding in completely randomized design, for a study period of 20 weeks.  Mean daily feed consumption, body weight gain, feed utilization efficiency and rate of survival were used as evaluation parameters. 

Both Local and White Leghorn chickens were suitable to scavenging conditions in terms of growth performance.  Mortality from hatching to maturity was higher for White Leghorn than for Local chickens kept under scavenging condition, indicating that exotic chickens are subjected to considerable hazard of diseases, parasites and predators under scavenging condition. Mean daily weight gain of supplemented scavenging White Leghorn chickens was higher than that of Local chickens kept under intensive condition, showing that White Leghorn chickens are more responsive to supplementation and more suitable to intensive production system, compared to Local chickens. Mortalities and morbidities were higher for Local than for White Leghorn chickens kept under intensive conditions. 

There seems to be no economic justification for supplementary feeding and intensive management of Local chickens for the purpose of meat production due to their poor feed utilization efficiency and low survival rate in captivity.  

Keywords: Chickens, growth, intensive systems, local,  scavenging, White Leghorn

Introduction  

The Ethiopian local chickens are estimated to be over 56 million, and traditional chicken rearing is practiced by virtually every family in rural Ethiopia, indicating that chickens are an affordable source of animal protein. Traditional chicken rearing fits quite well to the conditions of rural households, creates employments and generates family income. The small feed cost and space requirement and the low price of the animals make chicken rearing a suitable farming activity for the rural poor. Unfortunately, despite the fact that more than 99% of the Ethiopian poultry production system consists of local chickens, traditionally considered to be disease resistance and adaptive to their environment, their contribution to human nutrition, gross domestic products and export earnings are disproportionately low. The major reasons for such a low productivity (low rate of growth and delayed maturity) are low standards of management, health care and feeding. There is general agreement indicating that improvement in management and nutritional status of the local chickens could result in increased output per bird. But what has been studied so far in Ethiopia is not tangible enough to show the relative effects of genetic and non genetic factors on the growth performance of local chickens (Alemu Yami and Tadelle Dessie 1997). Thus the major objective of the study was to evaluate the comparative growth performance and survival of Local and White Leghorn chickens under scavenging and intensive systems of management.  
 

Materials and methods 

Experimental site  

This study was conducted in Ethiopia at Jimma College of Agriculture; located at an altitude of 1700m and 335 km southwest of the capital, Addis Ababa.  The trial on the scavenging condition was conducted within a peasant association located at a distance of 10 km from Jimma College of Agriculture. 

Production of experimental chickens 

Local eggs purchased from Jimma town and exotic eggs collected from the White Leghorn flock of Jimma College of Agriculture poultry farm were used for the experiment. An adequate number of eggs of each of Local and White Leghorn chickenswere selected against undesirable size, shape and shell structure. The selected eggs were fumigated with formaldehyde gas (17g KMn0₄ +100ml of 20% formalin) and incubated to hatch the experimental chickens.  

Management of the experimental chickens 

All the chickens were transferred from the incubator to a brooder house as soon as they were dry and placed on a standard starter ration (the only commercial ration with specified energy value and protein content that is available on the market in Ethiopia).  At an age of 10 days, 500 baby chickens of each breed were randomly selected and divided into 5 groups each with 100 chickens (5 groups of Local and 5 groups of White Leghorn).  Each group was housed in a separate experimental house equipped with all the necessary chick brooding facilities, and fed a commercial starter ration  for a period of 2 months (brooding period), followed by appetite feeding with commercial grower ration for an additional period of 3 months. Twelve groups of each of the two breeds, with 70 chickens each were, at the age of 10 days, distributed to 12 selected farmers who constructed their own hay-box brooder (a portable home-made box in which no artificial heat is employed used to raise baby chickens to an age of 8 weeks) (Demeke 2003), poultry house and poultry house equipment according to the design provided. The sex ratio of both the Local and White Leghorn baby chickens was almost 1:1 during the brooding period. Pooled mean values of equal number of males and females of each breed (separately raised during the rearing period) were used in data presentation and statistical analysis..  The selected farmers were given data collection forms and adequate amount of the required commercial poultry ration.  Finally the distributed chickens were subjected to scavenging condition, with or without a supplementary daily basic ration equal to 50% of the amount required for intensive feeding. Clean water was made available all the times, in all the cases. 

Data collection  

 In the cases of supplementation and appetite feeding, feed was offered at 10% above intake (adjusted daily) and refusals were collected and weighed once a day. The experimental chickens were weighed once a week. Feed consumption,  growth, feed conversion and economic efficiencies and rate of survival were used to evaluate the comparative growth performance of the experimental chickens, along with other related parameters.  

Statistical analysis  

An analysis of variance was carried out by Fisher's method (Snedecor and Cochran 1972) with Duncan's multiple range test for grouping treatment means, where F-values were significant (Duncan 1955).  

Result and discussion 

Growth 

There was no difference between White Leghorn and Local chickens raised under scavenging condition in mean daily body weight gain to 2 months (Table 1).  However, when supplementary feed was offered, the  performance of White Leghorn was superior both in scavenging and confinement conditions. Mortality was higher for White Leghorn than for Local chickens under scavenging conditions but the reverse was the case in confinement.

 

The growth performance of White Leghorn chickens kept under scavenging condition was improved (by 10 and 21%, during the brooding and rearing period, respectively), as a result of supplementation with a daily basic ration of 50% of normal requirements (Tables 1 and 2). There was no effect of supplementation on rate of growth of Local chickens kept under scavenging conditions.  At an age of 5 months under intensive management, Local chickens reached 81% of the mean body weight achieved by White Leghorn chickens (Table 2). However, feed conversion was much poorer in the Local birds. 

The result of this study showed that White Leghorn chickens are suitable for scavenging conditions in terms of growth performance, and that they are more responsive to supplementation than Local chickens.  The poor performance of Local chickens under intensive management is in agreement with the findings of Teketel Forsido (1986), who reported that the body size and the carcass weight of intensively managed Local chickens from southern Ethiopia reached 61 and 64% of that of White Leghorn chickens kept under similar conditions at an age of 6 months. Abebe Hassen (1992) also reported that the body weights of intensively managed Local chickens from eastern Ethiopia attained 72% of the weight of White Leghorn chickens kept under similar conditions at 6 months of age. 

Feed consumption and family income  

Under intensive management, the feed consumed from hatching to maturity (defined as 5 months of age) was higher (P<0.05) for Local than for White Leghorn chickens. The market price of live poultry in Ethiopia varies depending on sex, color, size, age, market locations and fasting and non-fasting periods (AACMC 1984). Feed cost also varies from place to place (Alemu Yami and Tadelle Dessie 1997). At the time of conducting this experiment, the market price of live mature chicken was about Birr 10 to 15. In order to reach slaughter weight of 1.5 kg, about 18 kg of commercial ration (Birr 25) was needed to raise day-old Local chickens, compared to 11 kg of commercial ration (Birr 14)for White Leghorn chickens.  

There seems to be no economic justification for either supplementary or appetite feeding of Local chickens in Ethiopia due to their poor feed utilization efficiency and to the high cost of poultry feed.  This result is in agreement with that of Burley (1957), Teketel Forsido (1986) and Goshu Mekonen (1981) who reported that there is an increase in the production performance of Local chicken with improvement in feeding and management, but not to at an economically acceptable level.  Local chickens are appropriate for the traditional low input - output system, since they hatch their eggs and brood chickens (Alemu Yami and Tadelle Dessie 1997). 

Survival rate 

Mortality from hatching to maturity was  higher  (P<0.05) for White Leghorn than for Local chickens kept under scavenging condition with or without supplementation (Tables 1and 2). Highest losses occurred during the early phase of the experiment in White Leghorn chickens. The superior health status and rate of survival of Local compared to White Leghorn chickens, kept under scavenging conditions with or without supplementation, is in agreement with the report of AACMC (1984) that Local chickens are well adapted to the local environment and considered to be disease resistant. Exotic chickens introduced into scavenging conditions of Ethiopia are subjected to considerable hazards of diseases, parasites and predators. They appeared to be less alert and responsive to sound / signal communication traits which are important under the Ethiopian scavenging conditions, characterized by prevalence of predators. 

Local chickens kept under intensive management were inferior to White Leghorn chickens kept under similar conditions in health status and rate of survival.  Lack of interest in their environment, wing droppings, huddling at the corners, signs of leg weakness, and cannibalism were frequently seen among Local chickens kept under intensive management.  Local chickens kept in captivity (managed intensively), were also slow in rate of feathering, and exhibited recurrent outbreaks of disease, which tended to spread to the others.  Higher mortalities and morbidities among Local compared to White Leghorn chickens kept under intensive management conditions  have been reported in Awassa (Teketel Forsido 1986), in Debre Zeit (Abebe Hassen 1992), in Arsi (Brännng and Pearson 1990) and in Alemaya (Abebe Hassen 1992).  The reason for high mortality of Local chickens under intensive management could be due to the fact that they are not used to confinement. Probably diseases which are important under confinement in Ethiopia, such as coccidiosis, chronic respiratory disease, Marek's disease, and Salmonella pullorum and nutritional deficiencies could cause more serious problems in Local than in exotic stock (Tadelle Dessie and Ogle 1996). 

Conclusions  

• In terms of growth performance, White Leghorn chickens are equally suitable to scavenging conditions as Local chickens, and are more responsive to supplementation. However, their survival rate is lower.

• There seems to be no economic justification for keeping Local chickens under intensive management systems for the purpose of meat production due to their poor feed utilization efficiency and low survival rate in captivity. 

References 

Abebe Hassen 1992 Terminal report on the comparative evaluation of native chicken in the Hararge Administrative Region and their crosses with the single comb White Leghorn.  Mimeographed report. 

Alemu Yami and Tadelle Dessie 1997 The status of poultry research and development in Ethiopia. Proceedings of the 5^th national conference of the Ethiopian Society of Animal Production. 15-17 May 1997, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. 

AACMC (Australian Agricultural Consulting and Management Company) 1984  Livestock sub sector review, volume 1, Annex 3. 

Brännäng E and Pearson S 1990 Ethiopian Animal Husbandry. Uppsala, Sweden, pp 127. 

Burley R H 1957 IECA and JATS staff report.  Agriculture of Ethiopia, Volume VI. 

Duncan D B 1955 Multiple range and multiple F-test Biometrics.11:1-42. 

Goshu Mekonen 1981 Summary of animal production research. AAU. Debre Zeit Agricultural Research Center.  

Snedecor W G and Cochran G W 1972  Statistical methods, 6^th edition  Iowa State University Press. Ames.  IA. 

Solomon Demeke 2003 Suitability of home made hay-box brooder to the Ethiopian rural household poultry (Submitted to Livestock Research for Rural Development) 

Tadelle Dessie and Ogle B 1996 A survey of village poultry production in the central highlands of Ethiopia, MSc thesis. Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, Upsalla, Sweden 

Teketel Forsido 1986 Studies on the meat production potential of some local strains of chicken in Ethiopia. PhD Thesis.  J.L. University of Giessen, pp 210.