A Quantitative Method for Age Determination of Adult Birds

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Abstract
The hypothesis that differential growth of bones would provide a means for identifying ages of adult birds was tested with material from 152 White Leghorn chickens of 2 adult age cohorts (2.25 and 3.25 yr, respectively). Variables were weights of the patellae, leg tendon splints, skull, mandible, scapulae, coracoids, furcula, sternum, radii, ulnae, humeri, pelvis, femora, tibiotarsi and tarsometatarsi. The weight of dried eye lenses was also included in the model. Simple log transformations of the data from females were subjected to discriminant analyses and yielded a canonical correlation of 0.8498 and subsequent 91% correct classification of individual birds to age class. Multiplicative indices derived from the data from males yielded similar results. The technique provides a means of separating adult classes of birds not distinguishable on the basis of plumage.

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