This study was conducted in Hadiya Zone of Southern region, Ethiopia with an objective to assess the breeding practices and performance of the local chicken populations in the study area. Multi-stage sampling method was used for selecting the study districts and participants based on the potential of the poultry genetic resources and accessibility towards the research sites. Among purposively identified local owners, a total of 180 households having chickens (90 from each district) were randomly selected for interview. Both primary and secondary data were collected during the survey. Majority of the farmers respond as they were culling their chickens for different reasons. Among them the higher proportion of the farmers in the study area had given the response as they were culling their chickens for poor production followed by culling for health status. In case of brooding, for majority of the respondents the strong broody behavior of the chickens was considered as a selection criteria followed by moderately broody behavior. Some others preferred criteria like mothering ability of the hens, growth rate, safeguard and body size of the chicks. Mean egg production/clutch in this study was 10.73eggs/hen. The average clutch number of the indigenous chicken was 3.72/year. Local chickens are well adapted to the tropics, resistant to poor management, feed shortages, tolerate to diseases and provide better test of meat and eggs than exotic chicken. However, they are poor in performance in terms of sexual maturity, egg size, growth rate, clutch size and hatchability. So, it is better to give emphasis for their management in order to get relevant production from local chickens.

Keywords : Breeding Practices, Local Chickens, Performance .