Gender Effect on Carcass and Meat Quality Characteristics in Gerze Native Chickens

Introduction: In order to meet the world's poultry meat demand, it is necessary to produce birds with fast growth characteristics and high carcass yield. For scientists and the breeders improving the meat quality is one of the most important aim. The studies on native breeds is essential to evaluate the value of these breeds. Many researchers have reported studies comparing gender and slaughter weights, meat yield, and quality in poultry such as chickens, but Gerze genotype. Methods: This study aimed to evaluate the gender effect on the carcass and meat quality traits in Gerze native chicken. The animal material was consist of 20 male and 20 female Gerze native chickens. One-way analysis of variance was used to evaluate the data. Results: As a results, we found cold carcass weights as 1012.60±22.95 g and 702.76±20.33 g for male and female chickens with statistically significant difference (p<0.01). The gender effect was found statistically insignificant (p>0.05) for all color values on pectoralis major and gastrocnemius muscles. There were no differences between the genders (p>0.05) for freezing loss, drip loss, cooking loss, and water holding capacity. Results also showed that there were no statistical differences between the genders (p>0.05) for hardness, adhesiveness, springiness, cohesiveness, gumminess, chewiness, and resilience. Conclusion: Results showed that there were no differences between male and female Gerze native chickens for meat quality traits.