Growth Curves for Body Weight and Some Body Measurement of Ross 308 Broiler Chickens

Abstract

Mendeş, M. 2009. Growth curves for body weight and some body measurement of Ross 308 broiler chickens. J. Appl. Anim. Res., 36: 85–88.

To investigate the growth characteristics of Ross 308 male broiler chickens 30 male broiler chickens were used. Results of growth curve analyses suggest that the Gompertz growth model fitted the weight-age, shank width-age, shank length-age and body length-age data very well, while the linear growth model fitted the breast bone length-age, breast width-age and breast circumference-age data. The growth rate (b) for body weight (0.04) was found obviously smaller than that of shank width (0.23), shank length (0.18) and body length (0.23). Inflection point (k) for shank width and body length was found similar. For one weak increase in age a 19.49 mm enhancement in breast bone length, 6.41 mm enhancement in breast width and 4.06 cm enhancement in breast circumference are expected. All regression slope estimates (except for breast width) were significant.

Keywords:

• Growth curve
• body measurement
• nonlinear regression
• broiler chicken