RESEARCH ARTICLE CHARACTERIZATION OF FLOCK STRUCTURE, BREEDING OBJECTIVES AND CULLING CRITERIA IN SUDANESE NATIVE CHICKENS

The present study aims at investigating flock structure, breeding objectives and culling and selection criteria of Sudanese native chickens. A survey was conducted in three regions namely Kordofan, Blue Nile and Gedaref, where in each region 3 - 5 districts were randomly considered. A structured pre - tested questionnaire was used to collect data households about Sudanese native chickens reared under rural conditions. A total of 209 households were interviewed and the data we re analyzed using SPSS Statistical software Verion - 16; moreover ANOVA and Duncan Multiple Range Test were also used for comparison among different regions and separation between means respectively. Moreover chi square (χ2) test for independence was perform ed to detect differences between regions. Results showed that average flock size and cock hen ratio were 31.18 and 1:2.7 respectively; whereas the flock structure consisted of 39% chicks, 20.5% pullets, 15.9% cockerels, 18% hens and 6.6% cocks. The number of birds added to/or exiting from the flock were 3.84 and 58.83, respectively. The reasons for adding birds to the flock was to maintain reasonable flock size after prevalence of diseases, while exiting birds from the flock was due to mortality, slaughteri ng, selling and donating. The average egg number per cycle was 11.56. Farmers ranked body size and plumage color as the most important factors affecting breeding choice of the breed, while the reproductive performance and fast growth rate were the most pre ferred traits. The average effective population size was 6.06 and the subsequent average inbreeding coefficient was 0.083. As culling criteria, the households used body size and health status for both male and female birds, while feather color in cocks and mothering ability in hens were also used for culling. Farmers graded quality traits of their bred chickens into three main categories (good, average and poor) with high grade given to morphological, reproductive and meat taste aspects.