Amount of Breast Meat and Live and Dressed Grades in Relation to Body Measurements in 12-Week Old Purebred and Crossbred Chickens

PART I. BREAST MEAT OBSERVATIONS DURING recent years a considerable amount of investigational work has been carried on to determine the relationship between body measurements of live birds and body conformation in dressed birds. Emphasis has been given to factors affecting the degree of breast fleshing although very few reports have been made available concerning the amount of breast meat on the carcass as related to different body measurements in purebred as compared with crossbred chicks in the early growing stage. Lerner (1937) suggested tarsometatarsus (shank) length as a criterion of size. Lerner (1939) obtained a correlation coefficient of 0.659±0.032 between live body weight and shank length in Single Comb White Leghorn mature females. Shank length and body weight at 4, 8, 12, and 16 weeks were studied by Lerner in the progeny of Barred Plymouth Rock matings and in Barred Plymouth Rock and Single Comb White Leghorn crosses. It . . .