Productive Performance and Egg and Meat Quality of Two Indigenous Poultry Breeds in Vietnam, Ho and Dong Tao, Fed on Commercial Feed

SIMPLE SUMMARY: Indigenous chicken breeds adapt well to the local conditions and provide the genetic diversity required to improve the development of poultry breeds. Nowadays, the intensive systems of chicken production use only hybrid lines with high genetic potential. These lines are a serious threat to the conservation of indigenous chicken breeds in the world. Therefore, research on indigenous chicken breeds are necessary in elucidating conservation and sustainable development strategies with respect to these chicken breeds. This work evaluates the production and laying performances, and the meat and egg quality of two breeds of Vietnamese broiler chickens, Ho and Dong Tao. Our work shows that the production performances of the two breeds are low compared to commercial lines. Improving the production and reproduction performances of these animals is necessary in contributing to the program of conservation and sustainable exploitation of these two emblematic breeds. ABSTRACT: The objective of this work was the evaluation of the meat production and laying performances, and the meat and egg quality of two breeds of Vietnamese broiler chickens, Ho and Dong Tao, fed on a commercial diet. In a survey, we continuously recorded for 28 weeks, the data on the production performance and meat quality of 250 chicks from each breed. We investigated egg laying and egg quality using 36 Ho and 32 Dong Tao hens during 52 weeks of laying. The growth patterns were similar for the two breeds. Feed conversion ratios were also similar, and demonstrated the low efficiency of these two breeds when compared to commercial broilers. Slaughter age proved to affect several carcass yield characteristics, showing that slaughtering between 16 and 20 weeks might be better than at the usual age of 28 weeks. Yield, carcass composition and meat quality differed between the two studied breeds. The eggs production and number of embryonated eggs were low for the two breeds when compared to other breeds, with a lower hatching performance in Ho than in Dong Tao. In summary, the production performances of Ho and Dong Tao chickens were low, even when birds were fed a commercial diet. The study demonstrates the need to find ways to improve the production and reproduction performances of these animals, in order to contribute to the program of conservation and exploitation of these two breeds.