Abstract :

The purpose of the study is to determine how geographical proximity, climate, and topography influence the morphology of village chickens in Jordan’s Karak Governorate. Surveys were conducted in six regions of Karak as well as Tafilah, Madaba, Aqaba, and Al-Mafraq governarates. These governarates were included because they are geographically close to Karak Governorate and can be compared in terms of topography and climate. The morphology and biometric data of each male and female bird, including the exterior shape of the bird, body weight, colors, and measurements of body parts, were recorded during a field survey in the targeted regions. Each breeder’s information was gathered, and each chicken was photographed separately. Afterward, various statistical analyses were utilized to distinguish between morphological traits, perform clustering, and conduct differential analyses. The Mahalanobis distances (measure of the distance between a point P and a distribution D) were also calculated and estimated. The findings demonstrated that there are disparities in the phenotypic features of chickens between the sexes and between geographical areas. Village chickens are still raised in a traditional manner; as a result, there have been no genetic improvement techniques used or gene flow from geographically remote regions. Also as a result, chickens in Karak Governorate still resemble one another and their ancient ancestors in terms of morphological traits. In all regions and in both genders, the dominating traits were the pink color and single comb, the beige beak, the orange eye color, and the red earlobe with white speck. The difference in regions and height led to a significant difference in the appearance of traits in males and females.