English

Abstract

A quick survey study was conducted with the objectives of assessing farmers trait preference and productive performance of Sasso provided by Ethio-chicken private poultry farms under village production system in three agro ecologies of SNNPR, Ethiopia. Totally, 135 randomly selected respondents (45 from each agro ecologies) were included in the study. The data collected were analyzed using descriptive statistics and one way ANOVA. According to the respondents most of the farmers were currently rearing more Sasso breeds in all agro ecologies (40.4, 72.7 and 47.7 in highland, midland and lowland respectively) than Bovans brown (17, 6.8 and 20.5% in highland, midland and lowland respectively). Current study exposed that 94.4% of respondents on average in all agro ecologies select Bovans brown for egg production while Sasso breed was selected by respondents (97.7%) for having large body size and producing high amount of meat. The information collected on age at first laying disclosed that the mean ages at first laying were 5.9±1.5, 5.7±1, and 7.1± 1.6 months for Sasso, Bovans brown and local breeds respectively. The result in the current study revealed that the average egg production per month of Bovans brown (22.2) is higher than that of Sasso (16.2) and local chickens (12.6). Most respondents repeatedly mentioned feed shortage as the first ranked chicken production constraint in all districts (25.4%) whereas predators (20.1%) were the second and disease was the third problem in overall agro ecologies though there were significant (p<0.05) differences among agro ecologies. To have a clear understanding of the performance of Sasso breeds of ethio-chicken private farms, on-farm and on-station controlled experiment on management practices and feeding strategy is important. Key words: Sasso, agro ecologies, productive performances, trait preference.