Determination of egg production performance of backyard hens and commercial layer hens under free-range production conditions

This research was carried out in free-range conditions for 16 weeks with 25 backyard chickens of unknown genotype and 25 Isa Brown laying hens aged 30 weeks. There are 3 30 week old roosters in each group. During the experiment, the chickens were housed in a 0.35 m2 closed coop area per bird in the hen with perches and a nest with traps. They were also allowed to alternately wander in the crawling area and consume fresh grass after 14 o'clock on days when the weather was suitable. In the study, with daily and weekly measurements, live weight, feed consumption, feed conversion rate, egg production, egg weight, eggshell thickness, egg shape index, eggshell breaking resistance, egg yolk height, white egg height, egg yolk, and egg white weight were determined. , shell weight, eggshell color, and egg yolk color values were determined. In line with the findings, the egg yield of the Isa Brown chicken breed was 98.7 %, and the backyard chicken breed was 76 %. The feed conversion ratio was determined as 1.77 in Isa Brown breed chickens and 2.44 in backyard chickens. It was concluded that the Isa Brown breed is more suitable for breeding in free-range conditions regarding live weight, egg weight, egg yolk weight, and shell durability.