Methodical guidelines for the estimation of the breeding value for selected health characteristics in dairy cattle

ZAVADILOVÁ, Ludmila, KAŠNÁ, Eva, FLEISCHER, Petr and ŠTÍPKOVÁ, Miloslava. Methodical guidelines for the estimation of the breeding value for selected health characteristics in dairy cattle. Praha Uhříněves: Výzkumný ústav živočišné výroby v.v.i., 2018, 10 p. ISBN
Year2018
CathegoryOthers
No. of pages10
Internal link18290.pdf
Abstract

Methodological guidelines for estimating breeding value for selected health features in dairy cattle focus on the estimation of breeding values for clinical mastitis and claw diseases in dairy cows. These estimates will allow the selection for decreasing incidence of claw disease or of clinical mastitis in Holstein cattle. For breeding goals, we define the health traits (clinical mastitis, claw disorder and diseases) as a binary variable i.e. the occurrence of health trait yes/no in lactation. For clinical mastitis (CM), lactation is defined as a normalized lactation of 240 – 305 days. Parts of lactation are defined by intervals of 0 – 100 days of lactation, 101 – 200 days of lactation and 201 – 305 days of lactation, 0 – 150 days of lactation, or 151 – 305 days of lactation. With the definition of the hoof disorder and disease, we start from the ICAR Key. There are three aggregate categories of origin and disease type: • Infectious Disease Category (INF): digital dermatitis, interdigital dermatitis, interdigital phlegmon and heel horn erosion • Claw and horn disorder category (CHD), including ulcers, white line disease, horn fissures, double sole and sole hemorrhage overall foot and claw disorder (OCD) category, which includes INF and CHD, as well as lameness and swelling. For the evaluation of clinical mastitis (CM) and claw disorders and diseases (INF, CHD, OCD) we propose to use a linear animal model with random effects of additive effect of the individual and permanent environment of the individual and residual effect and with fixed effects of herd, year and period of calving, order of lactation , the age of calving.