Housing system affects broiler characteristics of local Chinese breed reciprocal crosses

Artificial selection in closed populations can fix or differentiate alternative alleles of loci associated with selected traits. Two closed chicken populations, A and B, originating from Jiuwu, a Chinese native breed, were bred for more than 10 generations. We compared progeny from reciprocal crosses (AB and BA) under free range (trial 1) and cage and pen (trial 2) systems. Traits measured included feed conversion, live BW, subcutaneous fat thickness, percentages of carcass, semi-eviscerated carcass, eviscerated carcass, breast muscle (pectoralis major and minor), leg muscle (boneless drum and thigh), heart, gizzard, proventriculus, liver, comb, and abdominal fat, plus moisture and fat content in breast muscle at 91 d. In trial 1, there were no significant differences between crosses for any trait except percentage proventriculus (AB > BA). Males were significantly heavier with greater proportions of semi-eviscerated carcass, leg muscle, heart, and comb than females, whereas females had thicker subcutaneous fat and higher percentage abdominal fat, breast muscle, gizzard, and proventriculus than males. In trial 2, chickens raised in cages were significantly heavier, had superior feed efficiency, thicker subcutaneous fat, higher fat content and percentage abdominal fat, carcass, semi-eviscerated carcass, liver, and comb than those reared in pens. Those reared in pens exhibited significantly greater proportions of breast muscle, gizzard, and proventriculus than those raised in cages. The only significant 2-way interaction was cross × sex for percentage semi-eviscerated and eviscerated carcass, because BA males were greater than other combinations. Interactions of cross × sex × housing system for percentage liver and abdominal fat were significant; cage-reared AB females displayed higher percentages than pen-reared BA males. Results implied that subpopulations should be considered rather than a single larger population as a way to reduce loss of genetic variation in local and heritage stocks. Although performance of reciprocal crosses was similar across housing systems, caging during the finishing stage of a slow-growing breed enhanced feed efficiency, BW, and meat composition.