Adoption of management practices in intensive native chicken rearing

A survey was undertaken to study the management practices adopted by the farmers rearing native breeder chicken under intensive management system in three district of Tamil Nadu. A total of 45 farms, 15 farms from each district were selected by simple random sampling and the data were collected through a semi-structured interview schedule. The selected farms were classified as small (15 farms), medium (15 farms) and large (15 farms) with the capacity ranged from up to 1500, 1501 to 3000 and above 3000 birds. Multiple batch system was mostly followed and farmers reared their birds under deep litter system with coir pith as a litter material. Asbestos roof with cement flooring was mostly followed and the water used mostly drawn from bore well sanitized with hydrogen peroxide. Brooding of native chicks was mostly done with charcoal up to 14 days. Native breeder chicken was debeaked twice before spiking the flock and the first and second debeaking was at the age of 13 and 95 days respectively. Most of the farmers used mash, crumble and pellet feed during brooder, grower and layer stages respectively.