Birth weight,reproduction traits and effects of inbreeding in Nicaraguan Reyna Creole cattle |
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Authors: | Roldan Corrales Anna Näsholm Birgitta Malmfors Jan Philipsson |
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Institution: | (1) Animal Sciences Faculty, National Agrarian University, P.O. Box 453, Managua, Nicaragua;(2) Department of Animal Breeding and Genetics, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, P.O. Box 7023, 750 07 Uppsala, Sweden; |
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Abstract: | Reyna Creole cattle in Nicaragua comprise about 650 purebred animals, and the breed has been shown to have a high level of
inbreeding. To characterize the breed, as basis for a conservation program, information from two herds on birth weight (BW,
n = 1097), age at first calving (AFC, n = 449) and calving interval (CI, n = 1,347) was analysed. Overall averages were 27.8 kg for BW, 37.4 months for AFC and 424 days for CI. Large differences between
the herds were observed for all traits. Thus, there would be opportunities for management interventions to improve reproduction
results. The heritability for BW was 0.34. For CI, the heritability of 0.20 and the additive genetic standard deviation of
36 days were comparatively high values. No genetic variation was found in AFC. Estimated inbreeding effects were associated
with large standard errors due to the small size of the data and incompleteness of pedigrees. Nevertheless, significant effects
were shown of dam inbreeding level on all traits. For each percentage of increased inbreeding, BW decreased by 0.06 kg, AFC
increased by 3.5 days and CI increased by 1.4 days. The effects of the inbreeding level of the individual itself were not
significant. The relatively good reproduction traits of Reyna Creole cattle shown in this study, despite high inbreeding levels,
will be supplemented with a characterization of milk production traits. |
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