Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-dk4vv Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-31T16:34:15.919Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Heritability of phenotypic udder traits to improve resilience to mastitis in Texel ewes

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 November 2018

R. E. Crump ,
S. Cooper ,
E. M. Smith ,
C. Grant  and
L. E. Green Open the ORCID record for L. E. Green [Opens in a new window]
R. E. Crump
Affiliation:
School of Life Sciences and Zeeman Institute for Systems Biology and Infectious Disease Epidemiology Research, University of Warwick, Coventry, CV4 7AL, UK
S. Cooper
Affiliation:
School of Life Sciences, University of Warwick, Coventry, CV4 7AL, UK
E. M. Smith
Affiliation:
School of Life Sciences, University of Warwick, Coventry, CV4 7AL, UK
C. Grant
Affiliation:
School of Life Sciences, University of Warwick, Coventry, CV4 7AL, UK
L. E. Green
Affiliation:
School of Life Sciences and Zeeman Institute for Systems Biology and Infectious Disease Epidemiology Research, University of Warwick, Coventry, CV4 7AL, UK
Get access

Abstract

There are no estimates of the heritability of phenotypic udder traits in suckler sheep, which produce meat lambs, and whether these are associated with resilience to mastitis. Mastitis is a common disease which damages the mammary gland and reduces productivity. The aims of this study were to investigate the feasibility of collecting udder phenotypes, their heritability and their association with mastitis in suckler ewes. Udder and teat conformation, teat lesions, intramammary masses (IMM) and litter size were recorded from 10 Texel flocks in Great Britain between 2012 and 2014; 968 records were collected. Pedigree data were obtained from an online pedigree recording system. Univariate quantitative genetic parameters were estimated using animal and sire models. Linear mixed models were used to analyse continuous traits and generalised linear mixed models were used to analyse binary traits. Continuous traits had higher heritabilities than binary with teat placement and teat length heritability (h2) highest at 0.35 (SD 0.04) and 0.42 (SD 0.04), respectively. Udder width, drop and separation heritabilities were lower and varied with udder volume. The heritabilities of IMM and teat lesions (sire model) were 0.18 (SD 0.12) and 0.17 (SD 0.11), respectively. All heritabilities were sufficiently high to be in a selection programme to increase resilience to mastitis in the population of Texel sheep. Further studies are required to investigate genetic relationships between traits and to determine whether udder traits predict IMM, and the potential benefits from including traits in a selection programme to increase resilience to chronic mastitis.

Keywords

geneticsintramammary infectionmeat sheeppedigreeselection
Type
Research Article
Information
animal , Volume 13 , Issue 8 , August 2019 , pp. 1570 - 1575
Copyright
© The Animal Consortium 2018 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

†

Present address: College of Life and Environmental Sciences, University of Birmingham, Edgbaston B15 2TT, UK. E-mail: [email protected]

a

Present address: The British Texel Sheep Society Ltd, Stoneleigh Park, Kenilworth, CV8 2LG, UK.

References

Casu, S, Pernazza, I and Carta, A 2006. Feasibility of a linear scoring method of udder morphology for the selection scheme of Sardinian sheep. Journal of Dairy Science 89, 2200–2209.Google Scholar
Casu, S, Pernazza, I and Carta, A 2010. Phenotypic and genetic relationships between udder morphology and udder health in dairy ewes. Small Ruminant Research 88, 77–83.Google Scholar
Conington, J, Cao, G, Stott, A and Bünger, L 2008. Breeding for resistance to mastitis in United Kingdom sheep, a review and economic appraisal. The Veterinary Record 162, 369–376.Google Scholar
Cooper, S, Huntley, SJ, Crump, R, Lovatt, F and Green, LE 2016. A cross-sectional study of 329 farms in England to identify risk factors for ovine clinical mastitis. Preventive Veterinary Medicine 125, 89–98.Google Scholar
Cooper, S, Huntley, SJ and Green, LE 2013. A longitudinal study of risk factors for teat lesions in 67 suckler ewes in a single flock in England. Preventive Veterinary Medicine 110, 232–241.Google Scholar
de la Fuente, LF, Gonzalo, C, Sànchez, J, Rodríguez, R, Carriedo, J and Primitivo, F 2011. Genetic parameters of the linear body conformation traits and genetic correlations with udder traits, milk yield and composition, and somatic cell count in dairy ewes. Canadian Journal of Animal Science 91, 585–591.Google Scholar
Fernandez, G, Alvarez, P, San Primitivo, F and de la Fuente, LF 1995. Factors affecting variation of udder traits of dairy ewes. Journal of Dairy Science 78, 842–849.Google Scholar
Grant, C, Smith, EM and Green, LE 2016. A longitudinal study of factors associated with acute and chronic mastitis and their impact on lamb growth rate in 10 suckler sheep flocks in Great Britain. Preventive Veterinary Medicine 127, 27–36.Google Scholar
Holand, AM, Steinsland, I, Martino, S and Jensen, H 2013. Animal models and integrated nested Laplace approximations. Genes, Genomes, Genetics 3, 1241–1251.Google Scholar
Huntley, SJ, Cooper, S, Bradley, AJ and Green, LE 2012. A cohort study of the associations between udder conformation, milk somatic cell count, and lamb weight in suckler ewes. Journal of Dairy Science 95, 5001–5010.Google Scholar
Kooperberg, C 2013. logspline: logspline density estimation routines. R package version 2.1.5. Accessed on 2 October 2018 from https://cran.r-project.org.Google Scholar
Legarra, A and Ugarte, A 2005. Genetic parameters of udder traits, somatic cell score, and milk yield in Laxta sheep. Journal of Dairy Science 88, 2238–2245.Google Scholar
Makovický, P, Margetín, M and Makovický, P 2015. Genetic parameters for the linear udder traits of nine dairy ewes. Veterinarski Arhiv 85, 577–582.Google Scholar
Marie-Etancelin, C, Astruc, JM, Porte, D, Larroque, H and Robert-Granié, C 2005. Multiple-trait genetic parameters and genetic evaluation of udder-type traits in Lacaune dairy ewes. Livestock Production Science 97, 211–218.Google Scholar
Ødegard, J, Meuwissen, TH, Heringstad, B and Madsen, P 2010. A simple algorithm to estimate genetic variance in an animal threshold model using Bayesian inference. Genetics Selection Evolution 42, 29.Google Scholar
Rue, H, Martino, S and Chopin, N 2009. Approximate Bayesian inference for latent Gaussian models by using integrated nested Laplace approximations. Journal of the Royal Statistical Society 71, 319–392.Google Scholar
Smith, EM, Willis, ZN, Blakeley, M, Lovatt, F, Purdy, KJ and Green, LE 2015. Bacterial species and their associations with acute and chronic mastitis in suckler ewes. Journal of Dairy Science 98, 7025–7033.Google Scholar
Spiegelhalter, DJ, Best, NG, Carlin, BP and van der Linde, A 2002. Bayesian measures of model complexity and fit. Journal of the Royal Statistical Society Series B 64, 583–639.Google Scholar
Supplementary material: File

Crump et al. supplementary material

Tables S1-S6 and Figures S1-S2

Download Crump et al. supplementary material(File)
File 376.1 KB