Genetic parameters of traits for updating the Reproductive index
Year | 2022 |
Cathegory | Others |
Internal link | 22140.pdf |
Abstract | Breeding of maternal pig breeds included in the CzePig National Breeding Program has been focused on improving growth, meat quality and litter size for more than two decades. Moreover, optimizing the length of the farrowing interval (FI) through a specific reproductive index (RI) is included there since 2017. The aim of RI is to improve the herd turnover and thus safety and sustainability of production. RI includes the traits: number of piglets born in total (TNB), born live (NBA) and piglets weaned (NW) and length of the FI of sows. Desirable genetic progress has been achieved in the population over the last five years. Due to the time gap it was necessary to update the genetic parameters of the population and thus reassess the selection setting correctness. Estimation of genetic correlations, genetic standard deviations and reliability of estimation of breeding values (BV) of traits according to valid methodologies (Wolf et al., 1999; Krupa and Wolf, 2013 and Krupa et al., 2016) were included into the update. The performance testing database provided by the Association of the Czech Pig Breeders, i.a. was used as the information source. The relationship matrix included 144,706 and 92,439 animals of the Czech Large White (CLW) and Czech Landrace (CL) breed, respectively. When comparing the inputs which were applied in the index creation five years ago, the genetic correlations between the litter size traits remained higher (e.g. 0.693 between TNB and NBA in CLW breed). Correlations between litter size traits and FI remained low and positive (e.g. 0.058 between NBA and FI in CL breed), indicating that direct selection for FI is needed to further improve sow reproductive performance. The reliability of the BV estimate was slightly increased by 7% over the last period and currently ranges from 0.134 (FI in CL breed) to 0.516 (TNB in CLW breed). A more significant increase of reliability was calculated for litter size traits.. |
VÚŽV v.v.i. > List of our publications >