Walailak Journal of Science and Technology (Nov 2011)
Estimation of Additive, Non Additive Gene Effects and Genetic Parameters on Pre-Weaning Growth Traits in Goats Meat in Southern Thailand
Abstract
A total of 791 animals involved in Thai Native (T), Boer (B), Saanen (S) and their crosses were studied. Fixed effects of sex, birth type, breed group and year-season of birth were found to significantly affect birth weight (BW), weaning weight (WW) and average daily gain (ADG) (P 0.05). Estimated direct and maternal heritabilities were found to be 0.25 and 0.08 for BW, 0.38 and 0.11 for WW and 0.35 and 0.12 for ADG. The direct genetic, maternal genetic and phenotypic correlations among pre-weaning traits were positive with moderate to high values (0.30 to 0.89). The findings provided basic information that farmers and breeders could utilize for an appropriate approach to crossbreeding and monitoring the genetic potential in this herd.
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