Heritability estimates for average daily gain and kleiber ratio in deccani sheep Bangar Y.C.*, Lawar V.S., Nimbalkar C.A.1, Shinde O.V., Nimase R.G. ICAR-Network Project on Deccani Sheep Improvement, Rahuri-413 722, Maharashtra 1Department of Statistics, Mahatma Phule Krishi Vidyapeeth, Rahuri-413 722, Maharashtra *E-mail address: yogeshbangar07@gmail.com
Online published on 21 March, 2018. Abstract To study the factors affecting average daily gain (ADG) and Kleiber ratio (KR) and to estimate the heritability for these traits, data of 1294 Deccani lambs maintained at ICAR-Network Project on Sheep Improvement, MPKV, Rahuri (Maharashtra) were used. The least-squares means for ADG1 (birth to weaning) and ADG 2 (weaning to six months of age) were 123.28±0.82 and 83.17±1.07 g, respectively. The least-squares means for KR 1 (ADG 1/weaning weight0.75) and KR 2 (ADG 2/six month weight0.75) were 16.47±0.05 and 8.02±0.09, respectively. Year and season of birth, sex of lamb and ewe's weight at lambing had significant (P<0.01) influence on ADG and KR with some exceptions. The estimates of heritability for ADG1, ADG2, KR1 and KR2 were low to medium (0.07±0.04, 0.14±0.06, 0.04±0.04 and 0.16±0.06, respectively) suggesting low genetic variability in the studied population. Adoption of suitable measures to reduce environmental variability can be helpful in achieving desirable growth during pre-and post-weaning period in Deccani sheep. Top Keywords Average daily gain, Deccani sheep, Heritability, Kleiber ratio. Top |