Heritability of clinical tail-biting and its relation to performance traits
Clinical tail-biters were identified over a 12-month period at a commercial nucleus pig-breeding farm that had a history of tail-biting problems. The breed, gender, and relative size of the tail-biters were recorded. Using pedigree data for all the pigs on the farm at the time of observations, the h...
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Published in | Livestock production science Vol. 93; no. 1; pp. 87 - 94 |
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Main Authors | , , , , , , |
Format | Journal Article |
Language | English |
Published |
Elsevier B.V
01.04.2005
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Subjects | |
Online Access | Get full text |
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Summary: | Clinical tail-biters were identified over a 12-month period at a commercial nucleus pig-breeding farm that had a history of tail-biting problems. The breed, gender, and relative size of the tail-biters were recorded. Using pedigree data for all the pigs on the farm at the time of observations, the heritability of the tail-biting behaviour was estimated for purebred Large White (LW) and Landrace (LR) pigs. The incidence of tail-biting was 2.8% for Large White and 3.5% for Landrace (breed effects,
P<0.10). Tail-biting was found to be heritable in Landrace (
h
2=0.05±0.02,
P<0.05 as a 0–1 trait, equivalent to
h
2=0.27 as a continuous trait), but not heritable in Large White pigs (
h
2=0.00±0.00, as a 0–1 trait). In the Landrace population, tail-biting was unfavourably genetically correlated with leanness [lean tissue growth rate (LTGR;
r
g=0.27,
P<0.05), and back fat (BF) thickness at 90 kg (
r
g=−0.28,
P<0.05)]. It is concluded that past selection for desirable production traits may have resulted in increased predisposition to exhibit tail-biting behaviour. From the correlations and covariance matrix reported, it would be possible to develop a selection index to reduce the predisposition to exhibit tail-biting behaviour through selective breeding. |
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ISSN: | 0301-6226 1872-6070 |
DOI: | 10.1016/j.livprodsci.2004.11.009 |