Evaluation of External and Internal Egg Characteristics of Frizzle, Naked-Neck and Normal Smooth feather Strains of Nigeria Indigenous Chickens Genotypes for Productive Performance

This study evaluated the external and internal egg characteristics of Frizzle, Naked-Neck and Normal Smooth-feathered strains of Nigerian indigenous chickens to determine their relative productive performance. The study was conducted at the Poultry Breeding and Research Unit of the Department of Animal Science, Ebonyi State University, Abakaliki. The birds were maintained under uniform management and feeding conditions, with commercial diet provided throughout the experimental period. Eggs were randomly sampled from each replicate and evaluated for external and internal quality characteristics. The external traits assessed included egg weight, egg length, egg width, egg shape index, shell weight and shell thickness, while internal traits included yolk weight, yolk length, yolk width, yolk height, yolk colour, yolk index, albumen weight, albumen height and Haugh unit. The results showed that Frizzle chickens recorded significantly higher egg weight (42.80 g), egg length (5.23 cm), egg width (3.80 cm), egg shape index (1.38) and shell thickness (33.17) than the other strains. Shell weight did not differ significantly among the three strains. For internal characteristics, Frizzle chickens had significantly higher yolk weight (14.75 g), albumen weight (23.83 g) and albumen height (5.03 cm). Normal Smooth-feathered chickens recorded significantly higher yolk length (4.13 cm) and yolk width (4.05 cm), while Frizzle and Naked-Neck chickens had significantly higher yolk indices than the Normal Smooth-feathered strain. Yolk height and yolk colour did not differ significantly among the strains. Similarly, Haugh unit values of 75.62, 74.05 and 74.00 for Frizzle, Naked-Neck and Normal Smooth-feathered chickens, respectively, were not significantly different. The study concludes that genotype influences several external and internal egg characteristics, with the Frizzle strain generally demonstrating superior egg-quality performance. It is therefore recommended that superior indigenous chicken genotypes, particularly Frizzle, should be considered in breeding and improvement programmes aimed at enhancing egg quality and productive performance.