Meat poultry/commercial

Commercial Methods of meat type poultry 

            Commercial breeding programmes exist for most speciesof meat line poultry.The breeding companies keep a large number of pure lines.Growth rate was very important in early days of breeding for meat line domestic fowl (broilers).Many companies then used mostly mass selection techniques to select future parents from their pure lines.Large flocks of pure line birds would be reared with only a few of the most superior individuals being selected.The success of these breeding programmes are relied on the use of a simple genetic theory and selection for a primary trait(body weight)where genetic variations has not been depleted.Large breeding companies have the facilities and computer technology to be able to use large populations where they can use intense selection pressures.However,today's broiler industry requires genetic progress on several other bird's characteristics as well as body weight.Characters such as feed conversion efficiency,carcass confirmation,meat yields,chick viability,absence of leg or breast defects amd good reproductive performance in parent birds are important.Selection indices are therefore used to weight these breeding values.The need to access characteristics where individual's have to be killed requires some amount of sib testing. 

              

              Breeding programmes now have fully or part pedigree pure lines and use progeny testing.Most maet line domestic fowl and turkey strains dont thrive in cages , so a system of trp nesting may be used to identify eggs from individual females.Artificial insemination techniques also simplify the identification of the male parent.

                  When a high selection pressure for growth rate is applied to a pure line then its reproductive performance may decline.A breeding programmes needs to maintain a fairly high reproductive performance in the parent females otherwise the cost of producing the commercial chicks will be too high.Different selection criteria need to be applied to pure lines destined for use either nale ir female lines.Selection of pure lines destined as male parents will give a high weighting for growth,whereas pure lines for female parents will have greater selection pressure for reproductive success.Often,selection with female lines involves an early assessment of growth followed by using egg laying records to compute a final selection index