The characteristics of reproduction, milk and fleece yield of Tatvan herigi (Hamdani X Akkaraman melezi) sheep raised at rural conditions

In this thesis, the characteristics of the reproduction, the milk yield, and fleece yield of Tatvan Heriği (Hamdani x Akkaraman crossbred) sheep were investigated. The animal material consisted of a total of 150 head ewes and their lambs in Yoncabaşı village of Bitlis province. Each of body weight of ewes after shearing and ewes' greasy fleece were weighed using electronic digital weighing scale with 100 g sensitivity. Fleece samples were taken as sufficient quantity for analysis, according to the sampling technique, from area of the last rib on the right shoulder of 45 head of ewes in each flock. In Tatvan Heriği sheep, the pregnancy rate, the infertility rate, the abortion rate, the lambing rate, and the twinning rate as traits of reproduction were 96.67 %, 3.33 %, 2 %, 94.67 %, and 11.97 %, respectively. The fecundity, the litter size, and the survival rate at 150th day were found as 1.06, 1.12, and was 100 %, respectively. The average birth weight of lambs, the mean body weight of ewes in parturition, and the mean pregnancy efficiency were 3.05±0.03 kg, 56.93±0.62 kg, and 6.34±0.02 kg, respectively. The means of the lactation milk yield and the lactation period of Tatvan Heriği ewes were 174.50±0.58 l and 221.77±1.57 day, respectively. Average greasy wool yield of Tatvan Heriği ewes was 2.51±0.04 kg. Average live weight after shearing was 64.97±0.27 kg. General mean for clean fleece percentage was found as 71.44±1.08 %. Keywords: Clean fleece percentage, Lactation milk yield, Live weight, Reproduction, Shearing, Tatvan Heriği.