Assessment on indigenous chicken incubation, brooding hen and chicks’ husbandry practice of farmers at different agroecological zones of Sidama Region, Ethiopia

Abstract

This study was conducted to assess indigenous chicken incubation practices of farmers at Hulla, Aleta Wondo and Dale districts representing highland, midland and lowland agro-ecologies respectively. From each agroecology two kebeles were purposively selected based on potential poultry production and road availability. About 256 households were purposively selected from six Kebeles for survey interview. The collected data were analyzed using SPSS version 20 and SAS version 9.0 packages. The result indicated that all of the respondents in the study areas incubate eggs only laid at home. The majority (75.8%) of respondents in all agro-ecologies do not select eggs for incubation. More of the respondents (in average 61.3%) in all agro-ecologies store incubating eggs for two weeks before the incubation (p>0.05). The majority of respondents (66.8%) in all agro-ecologies provide water to brooder hen afternoon only. (All (100%) of the respondents in all study agro-ecologies incubate eggs and rear their chicks naturally using broody hen. About 62.4%, 51% and 52% of respondents in highland, midland and lowland agro-ecologies respectively, responded that handling problem is the main cause of the failure to hatchability. In average, 57.4% of the respondents provide ad lib feed to chicks. On average, 96.5% of the respondents in the study areas provide free access of water to their chicks. Average number of eggs incubated per hen is 12.46±1.50 (mean±SD) with no significant difference between agro-ecologies (p>0.05). In conclusion, in the all agro-ecologies, farmers incubate eggs and brood chicks naturally by using broody hen, and they store incubating eggs for long time without considering storage condition. Therefore, it is important to develop awareness of farmers on storing eggs for long time as this decreases hatchability and declines the quality of table eggs. Promoting incubation and brooding technologies is necessary to improve the productivity of local chicken.