SEMEN QUALITY AND ARTIFICIAL INSEMINATION EFFICIENCY OF FAYOUMI, WHITE LEGHORN AND KOKKOEKES BREEDS WITH LOCAL HENS AT HARAMAYA UNIVERSITY

Abstract

The experiment was conducted to determine Semen quality and AI efficiency of fayoumi, white leghorn and kokkoekes breeds with local hens at Haramaya University. For the experiment of AI efficiency total of 45 similar hens were purchased from Karamile local markets. The hens were vaccinated and all management techniques were used according to Haramaya University poultry farm procedure. To determine semen quality, cockerels of 3 breeds and 10 from each breed with similar age were taken from Haramaya university poultry farm. The recorded parameters were secondary sexual traits, semen ejaculate volume, motility, concentration, pH, dead and abnormality of sperms and fertility and hatchability percentage. The mean values of comb length, comb width, wattle length and wattle width of Fayoumi, White leghorn and Kokkoekes were 5.53, 4.83, 4.43; 10.26, 8 .33, 7.7; 6.23, 4.43, 3.9 and 4.46, 3.63, 3.47 respectively. Fayoumi breed cocks had significantly higher values of sperm concentration, live sperms, sperm motility and significantly lower dead and abnormal sperms than White leghorn and Kokkoekes breeds. The phenotypic correlations between ejaculate volume and other semen traits ranged from 0.22 to 0.26. Secondary sexual traits, namely comb and wattle measurements, had positive phenotypic correlations with most semen physical traits. Whereas, the phenotypic correlations were mostly positive and ranged from 0.08 to 0.286 which can be used as indi cators for high semen physical quality traits in the cocks. The fertility and hatchability were 88.2, 93.3 fayoumi, 81.82, 81.82 White leghorn and 71.5, 80.36 Kokkoekes respectiv ely. In the study fayoumi breed showed highly significant variation (p<0.01) than other breeds on hatchability and fertility percentage. There was positive correlation between sperm quality parameters and physical appearance of the cocks. From this result it could be concluded that fayoumi breed showed good sperm performance, fertility and hatchability percentage, hence it is possible to recommend this breed for poultry improvement program in the country.