Factors Affecting the Survival of Ostrich from Hatching Untilthe Age of 48 Weeks

Abstract

The study aimed to investigate the effect of the combination of year and season of breeding period, egg weight, the annual hatching order of chicks and the hatchability of eggs on the relative risk of total loss for chicks during their 48-week life period. The examination was conducted on one of the largest farms in Hungary working with sixty breeding birds, kept in trios (one male and two females). The research covered the growing information of 1606 chicks hatched in 2019, 2020 and 2021. The highest relative risk of total loss was revealed in autumn 2020 and 2021. In comparison with the reference group (2021 summer), the relative risk of total loss was significantly lower in summer 2019 (p < 0.05) and spring 2020 (p = 0.0049) 2020 (p = 0.0000) and 2021 (p = 0.0348) spring. Both between years and between seasons the tendency of relative risk was the same. The relative risk of total loss increased until the end of the third quart of the incubation period, then remained unchanged. Chicks from groups having weak hatchability (≤50%) had the highest relative risk (p < 0.05).