author(s)
Santosh Pal, Tushar Gupta, Shivaji Wagh and Dileep Kumar Yadav

abstract
A 20-week experiment using three chicken breeds namely Kadaknath (KN), Aseel (AP) and CARI - Red (CR) and four groups (AP x CR, CR x AP, KN x CR, CR x KN) each had 150 birds per group was undertaken to evaluate efficiency of direct crosses and their reciprocal crosses with respect to body weight, conformation traits. AP x CR had highest body weight (1485g at 20wk), shank length (96.00mm at 20wk), keel length (102mm at 20 wk) than other crosses of experiment at all ages of measurement and significant difference had been revealed for body weight, conformation traits. Normally reciprocal crosses had lower FCR value than their respective direct crosses and FCR increases as age of bird increases. At 19-20 week of age KN x CR had highest FCR (7.67) whereas, AP x CR and CR x KN had lowest FCR (7.53). It is concluded that AP x CR was better in body weight, shank length and keel length.