Agricultural and Biological Research

Effects of genotype on fertility and hatchability of funeral alpha chicken

Jeremiah TB*, Wheto M and Adebambo AO

This project was carried out to determine the effect of genotype, used as a treatment on fertility, hatchability, and embryonic mortality of Funaab Alpha indigenous chicken. In the cause of the project, a total of 100 birds commercial lines of funaab alpha of the genotypes that includes, naked neck, frizzle, normal feather raised at the Pearl unit at the directorates of university farms which proper feeding and water were given to the birds through the period of this study. Semen was collected from sires using a trusted procedure and inseminated into the dam to get fertile eggs. Eggs were collected, labelled according to genotype and then moved to the hatchery unit where it was stored at a very low temperature, to retain the content inside the eggs. Eggs were set on weekly basis, using the incubator, candling was carried out at the 18th day after the setting of eggs into the incubator, to identify fertile eggs. All contaminated eggs, bangers and infertile eggs were disposed while the fertile eggs were restored into the incubator. All hatched eggs developed into chicks on the 21st day and all dead in shell and weak in shell were set aside, the estimated values for them were noted. At the end of the study, it was noted that all the genotype used in the cause of this project had significant effect on the percentage fertility and percentage dead in shell. However, there was no significant on all the genotypes used in the cause of this study by the percentage hatchability, percentage dead in germ, or percentage weak in shell. This depicts that; genotype has a great influence on estimated hatchability and dead in shell of the eggs, resulting in embryonic mortality of eggs. Dead in shell is higher in naked neck genotype, followed by normal feather and least in frizzle while weak in shell is high in normal feather, followed by naked neck and least was in frizzle.