Performance and Carcass Characteristics of Dumyati, Muscovy, Peking and Sudani Duck Breeds

This experiment was conducted on 120 ducks (30 Dumyati, 30 Peking, 30 Muscovy and 30 Sudani ducks). The ducks were fed complete commercial diets, appropriate for respective species. Slaughter and slaughter value estimation were performed at the age of 12 weeks. Analysis of the chemical composition of meat was made on breast and thigh muscles. Cell-mediated immunity was examined by Phytohemagglutinin-P (PHA-P) at 10 weeks of age. The present result showed that Muscovy strain had significantly heavier body weight compared to remaining strains. Concerning sexual dimorphism, the Sudani strain has a greater dimorphism in body size between males and females(51.8%) followed by Muscovy (43.7%). Both Muscovy and Peking ducks possess better feed conversion ratio than Dumyati and Sudani. Regardless of breed effect, the males had significantly heavier body weight with more efficient feed conversion ratio than females. The Muscovy breed possesses better quality of meat than the Peking one due to lower body fat. With respect to cellmediated immunity, the present results showed that Dumyati breed in both sexes had significantly hyper responder to PHA-P injection at all times compared to other breeds. The results obtained in this study give some insight into the production parameters and immune response of the four breeds of ducks present in Egypt.