Bulletin of the National Research Centre (Jan 2019)
Some body measurements as a management tool for Shami goats raised in subtropical areas in Egypt
Abstract
Abstract Background This filed work was conducted to describe the morphological features of Shami goats in subtropical areas in Egypt. The study covered Southern Sinai and Noubaria districts in Egypt. Data were collected from 30 goats of different age groups. Fifteen were males and 15 were females. Results Results show that male was heavier and longer than female. The mean live body weight (LBW) of the male group was 35.40 kg, while that of female group was 33.46 kg. However, these differences were not significant (P > 0.05). The body length (BL) of male recorded 77.80 cm, while that of the female was 74.73 cm. Similarly, the heart girth (HG), as well as withers height (WH), was also higher (P < 0.05) in male than those of the female. Both HG (r = 0. 98) and neck circumference (NC) (r = 0.96) presented the highest correlations with LBW of males, while the measurements of BL and head length (HEL) presented the highest correlations (r = 0.95–0.86) with LBW of females. Live body weight of the male was accurately and significantly (P < 0.01) predicted by the measurements of HG and NC with R 2 = 0.98. While BL and paunch girth (PG) were significantly (P < 0.01) used to predict LBW of the female with R 2 = 0.92. Stepwise regression analysis determined that BL and HG were the major significant contributors to the LBW prediction equation of total (male and female). Body length was the first independent variable to enter the model followed by HG, NC, and PG entered the best-fitted regression models. Thus, they were the variables entered to obtain the optimal regression models. The high correlation values between predicted and actual live body weight measurements give credence to the validity of using these models for predicting live weights of Shami goats. Conclusions From this data, it could be concluded that the live weight can be predicted with high accuracy from some body measurements which can be exploited by goat producers for management, selection, and genetic improvement of Shami goats and could be used successfully in new breeding programs in Egypt.
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