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by
G.N. Akpa |
Total Records (
3 ) for
G.N. Akpa |
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G.N. Akpa
,
M.A. Galadima
,
A.I. Adeyinka
,
A.E.O. Malau-Aduli
and
S.B. Abdu
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This study was conducted to ascertain the relationship between Birth weight, Average Daily Gain (ADG) at 3, 6, 9 and 12 month of age and their first lactation milk yield in Friesian Friesian-Bunaji crossbred heifers. The effects of non-genetic factors such as season, parity and year of calving on the measured characteristics were also investigated. The average daily gains were computed from the monthly weight data. Other variable collected was milk production at first lactation. A total of 585 lactation records were used for the analysis. The average birth weight, ADG at 3, 6, 9 and 12 months and first lactation milk yield (FLMYD) were 26+0.4 kg, 0.39±0.03 kg, 0.43±0.05 kg, 0.4±0.4 kg and 945 kg. Average daily gains were significantly (p<0.05) affected by season of the year and the effect of calving year was highly significant (p<0.01). FLMYD was significantly affected by season (p<0.05) and calving year (p<0.01). There were positive genetic correlations between growth at 3, 6, 9 and 12 month and FLMYD. The environmental and phenotypic correlations between them were also positive. The heritability estimate was 0.21±0.09, 0.17±0.06, 0.17±0.08 and 0.13±0.01, for ADG at 3, 6, 9 and 12 months, respectively. The results of this study demonstrate that heifers with high genetic growth potentials would reach puberty earlier and would likely be bred and calve at an earlier age with high milk yielding ability. |
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M. Kabir
,
O.O. Oni
,
G.N. Akpa
and
I.A. Adeyinka
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Data on body weight and shank length measurement of 361 birds from 5 hatches, one week apart were analysed to obtain heritability estimates for body weight and shank length at 20, 30 and 40 weeks of age, as well as to establish the genetic and phenotypic correlations between the traits. The mean values for body weight at various ages showed good performance of all birds. The heritability estimates observed for body weight and shank length decreases with increasing age of birds. This observation agreed with the reports of some workers and disagreed with the findings of others. Differences however, in heritability estimates could be attributed to differences in method of estimation, breed, environmental effects and sampling error due to small data or sample size. There were positively high genetic and phenotypic correlations between body weight and shank length at these ages. The coefficient of genetic correlation (rg) ranged between 0.582 and 0.645, while the coefficient of phenotypic correlation (rp) ranged between 0.613 and 0.816. High and positive genetic and phenotypic correlations between body weight and shank length suggest that it was possible to predict body weight of live Rhode Island chickens on the basis of their shank length measurement, as an aid to farmers in areas where sensitive weighing scales are not readily available. |
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T.S. Olugbemi
,
C.O. Ubosi
,
G.N. Akpa
and
W.H. Esuga
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Fourty Eight day old broiler chicks of Anak 2000 strain were used to determine the effect of an antibiotic (Furazolidone) and antistress (Vitalyte) on production performance of broiler chickens. They were randomly assigned to four treatments comprising of Treatment 1 (T1:Control), Treatment 2 (T2:Antibiotic and Antistress), Treatment 3 (T3:Antibiotic) and treatment 4 (Vitalyte). Results obtained from the study showed no significant differences (P>0.05) in final weight, feed intake, feed conversion efficiency and live weight gain between weeks four to nine. Inclusion of antibiotics and antistress in broiler diets over the five week period did not improve performance. |
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