The objective of this study was to estimate genomic breeding values for milk yield in crossbred dairy goats. The research was based on data provided by 2 commercial goat farms in the UK comprising 590,409 milk yield records on 14,453 dairy goats kidding between 1987 and 2013. The population was created by crossing 3 breeds: Alpine, Saanen, and Toggenburg. In each generation the best performing ...

In this paper we present an application of rule-based expert systems to a farming problem. Concretely the prediction of the breeding value in Manchego ewes is studied for the early stage of their life in which the standard (BLUP) methodology cannot be applied. In this case the pedigree index (arithmetical mean between parents’ breeding value) is used to make the estimation. An alternative to th...

Timing of reproduction in a seasonal cycle is a life history trait with important fitness consequences. Capital breeders produce offspring from stored resources and, by decoupling feeding and reproduction, may bend the constraints caused by seasonality in food or predation. Income breeders, on the other hand, produce offspring from concurrent food intake, with the disadvantage of less flexibili...

Considering the rapid climate changes worldwide, with the purpose to reduce financial losses for dairy farmers and enable a more sustainable farming as well, there is an increasing necessity to implement breeding values for heat resistance in breeding strategies. The estimation of breeding values requires a determination of temperature-humidity index (THI) threshold value. Therefore, the object...

Mortality of laying hens due to cannibalism is a major problem in the egg-laying industry. Survival depends on two genetic effects: the direct genetic effect of the individual itself (DGE) and the indirect genetic effects of its group mates (IGE). For hens housed in sire-family groups, DGE and IGE cannot be estimated using pedigree information, but the combined effect of DGE and IGE is estimate...

Embryo transfer (ET) in Holstein dairy cattle became an important commercial enterprise after the introduction of non-surgical recovery technique. Embryo transfer could increase the reproductive rate of genetically superior cows. The objectives of the present study were to evaluate the use of ET in Iranian Holstein dairy cattle to increase selection intensity on the dam side, economically; esti...

OBJECTIVE This study was to determine the relationship between estimated breeding value and phenotype information after farrowing when juvenile selection was made in candidate pigs without phenotype information. METHODS After collecting phenotypic and genomic information for the total number of piglets born by Landrace pigs, selection accuracy between genomic breeding value estimates using ge...

Abstract: Heritability shows the degree of resemblance between relatives. Heritability is the most important genetic parameter on which different breeding strategy depends. The knowledge of heritability is a prerequisite for the formulation of breeding plans on scientific lines. There is need to know the heritability of different characters which are used for selection of parents for future bre...

This chapter reviews the recent developments of Value at Risk (VaR) estimation. In this survey, the most available univariate and multivariate methods are presented. The robustness and accuracy of these estimation methods are investigated based on the simulated and real data. In the backtesting procedure, the conditional coverage test (Christoffersen 1998), the dynamic quantile test (Engle and ...

Building on a solid foundation of performance testing, quantitative genetics, and statistical estimation of breeding values; recent developments in pig line improvement programs have included the application of both major gene and marker genomics, and an increased focus on genotype by environment interactions and crossbred selection objectives. Additionally, selection objectives have broadened ...