Abstract:
The study was conducted in Genji district of West Wollega Zone with the objectives of
characterization of scavenging poultry feed resource base(SFRB) and evaluation of
composition of crop content of scavenging indigenous chicken. A total of 183 households
were randomely selected fromthree kebeles of midland(126 respondents ) and two kebeles
of lowland (57 respondents) were used to collect primary data on SFRB of the study area. A total of 60 sampledgrower chickens (50% female and 50% male) at an age of 4-6 month, were parchased from rural farmers and slaughtered during early dry season to study the
physical characteristics and chemical composition of the crop content.The major poultry
feed resources of the study area was reported to be full day scavenging with supplementary
feeding with locally available feed materials. About 50.7,23.85, 12, 8.4 and 5.2% of the
crop contents of experimental chickens were cereal grains, house-hold leftover/kitchen
waste, animal proteins(insects/worms), plant/leaves, and none feed materialsrespectively. There was variation incomposition with altitude and sex of birds slaughtered. The mean
weight of the crop content obtained from the cockerels (25 g/day) was significantly lower
(p<0.05) than that of the pullets (34g/day),but there were no significant dif erence
between altitude in mean weight of crop content of the experimental birds
slaughtered.According to the result of laboratory analysis,the dry matter, ether extract, ash,crude protein, crude fiber, nitrogen free extract and calculated metabolizable
energycontentof the crop content were 89.37,2.48,14.82,10.88,9.35,62.61%
and2552.3kcal/kg),respectively. The percent composition of dry matter, ash, crude fiber, and calcium were significantely( p< 0.05 )higher in the crop content of pullets than in the
crop content of cockerels, while crude fiber and crude protein level of the crop contents of
the chcikens of the mid altitude were significantly higher(p<0.05) than that of the crop
content of chickens of the low altitude. The average SFRB estimated for the Genji district
was 237kg dry weight / family /year. The study showed that the nutrient contents of
scavengable feed resources during early dry season were below the bird’s requirements
foroptimum productivity. However,Poultry keepers must provide suf icient supplementation
to their birds rather than simply throwing leftovers "away to the birds".
