The study on reproduction and lamb growth performances of awassi and Cukurova meat sheep raised in research and application Farm of Faculty of Agriculture in Cukurova University

This study was carried out in order to investigate the reproduction performances of the Awassi sheep (n=25) and Cukurova Meat sheep (n=34) which recently gave birth, and to examine the growth performances of Awassi (n=19) and Cukurova Meat lambs (n=33) in Cukurova University Faculty of Agriculture Research and Application Farm Sheep Unit. The fertility rate was 64.00 and 76.47%; litter size was 118.75 and 126.92%; fecundity was 76.00 and 97.05%; the rate of twins was 18.75 and 19.23% in Awassi and Cukurova Meat sheep, respectively. No death was observed in lambs at birth and from birth to weaning (60th day). The birth weight and the weaning weight of the Awassi lambs were 4.4 and 25.0 kg, whereas the birth weight and weaning weight of Cukurova Meat lambs were found to be 4.1 and 21.1 kg. As a result of this study, it was determined that the fecundity rate of Cukurova Meat breed was higher than that of Awassi, and the effect of race and birth type on the weaning weight of lambs was significant (p <0.05), and the effect of race, gender and birth type on the increase of daily live weight was significant (p<0.05). In terms of live weight in 15, 30, 45 and 60 days, Awassi lambs were significantly better (p <0.05) and showed a high performance. The effect of gender on the birth and various periods of live weight was insignificant (p> 0.05), while the effect of birth type on birth, 30, 45 and 60 days live weight was found to be significant (p <0.05). Awassi lambs showed a higher performance than the Cukurova Meat lambs in terms of daily live weight gain.