Abstract :
[en] In Vietnam, 84% of the 188 million chickens are indigenous. The following local breeds are recorded: Ri, Mia, Te, Tau Vang, Ac, Oke, H’mong, Tre, Choi, Phu Lu Te, To, Dan Khao, Ho, Dong Tao and Van Phu. Mia, Ho and Dong Tao are reported as endangered or critical, while the Van Phu breed could have been lost during the last years. The phenotypes of the Mia and Ri breeds are described as quite close. The objective of this study is to characterize phenotypically Ri and Mia chickens. The morpho-biometric characterization was conducted according to the recommendation of FAO (1981). A total of 227 adults Ri (174 females and 53 males) and 53 adults Mia (18 males and 35 females) were used for the study. The following colors were observed for Ri and Mia respectively: tan (43.17% and 37.73%), gold salmon (24.23% and 26.42%), wheat (15.42% and 26.42%), dark red (9.69% and 5.66%), silver salmon (3.52% and 3.77%) and copper black (3.96% and 0%). Comb was mostly simple (91.19% and 100%) and red (100% and 100%) for both breeds. The wattles were of the same color as the comb while the color of the legs was yellow. The weights of adult males (2433.89g) and females (1752.86g) of the Mia breed were significantly higher than those of Ri (2053.02g and 1459.22g for males and females respectively). The results show that the external aspect of both breeds is not very different while body weights in the Ri breed were found lower than in the Mia breed.
