Effect of Egg Weight on post-Hatch Performance of White Leghorn Chicken Breed from Day-old to Laying Age

Abstract

The objective of the present study was to determine the effect of egg weight on hatchability, body weight, body weight gain, feed intake, feed efficiency, mortality, hen day egg production and egg weight. Hatching eggs (576) from a White Leghorn breeder flock were obtained at the age of 36 weeks and purposively divided into 3 egg-weight categories, namely small, medium, and large sizes having weights 44.26±0.21g, 50.39±0.11g, and 55.39±0.23g, respectively. Each egg group randomly further divided into three replicates each contained of 64 eggs in a completely randomized design. Eggs were incubated and hatched chicks were individually counted and weighed to determine the hatchability. Chicks hatched from similar egg size were grouped according to their initial treatment and replication. The male and female chicks were intensively raised together for 8 weeks and then only female birds maintained in the experimental conditions for fifty weeks. Data were summarized using the General Linear Model of SAS and the means were separated using Fisher’s LSD test. This study showed that egg sizes had significantly influenced (p