Bayesian approach; integration of external information; jumping horses
Abstract :
[en] The aim of this study was to test the integration of external information, i.e. foreign estimated breeding values (EBV) and the associated reliabilities (REL), for stallions into the Belgian genetic evaluation for jumping horses. The Belgian model is a bivariate repeatability Best Linear Unbiased Prediction animal model only based on Belgian performances while Belgian breeders import horses from neighbouring countries. Thereby, use of external information is needed as prior to achieve more accurate EBV. Pedigree and performance data contained 101,382 horses and 712,212 performances, respectively. After conversion to the Belgian trait, external information of 98 French and 67 Dutch stallions were integrated into the Belgian evaluation. Resulting Belgian rankings of the foreign stallions were more similar to foreign rankings according to the increase of the rank correlations of at least 12%. REL of their EBV were improved of at least 2% on average. External information was partially to totally equivalent to 4 years of contemporary horses’ performances or to all the stallions’ own performances. All these results showed the interest to integrate external information into the Belgian evaluation.
Disciplines :
Animal production & animal husbandry Genetics & genetic processes
Calo L.L., McDowell R.E., VanVleck L.D., Miller P.D. (1973) Genetic aspects of beef production among Holstien-Friesians pedigree selected for milk production. J. Anim. Sci., 37, 676-682.
Gengler N., Vanderick S. (2008) Bayesian inclusion of external evaluations into national evaluation system: application to milk production traits. Interbull Bull., 38, 70-74.
Goddard M. (1985) A method of comparing sires evaluated in different countries. Livest. Prod. Sci., 13, 321-331.
Interstallion (2005) Recommendations on Choice of Scale and Reference Population for Publication of Breeding Values in Sport Horse Breeding. Interstallion, Leuven, Belgium (available at: http://www.biw.kuleuven.be/genlog/livgen/docs/publicationscale.pdf; last accessed 19 March 2012).
Janssens S., Buys N. (2008) Genetische Index Voor Springen - GSIn2008. Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Leuven, Belgium (available at: http://www.biw.kuleuven.be/genlog/livgen/chgs_ebv/GenetischeSpringindex_ 2008.pdf; last accessed 19 March 2012).
Janssens S., Geysen D., Vandepitte W. (1997) Genetic parameters for show jumping in Belgian sport horses. In: Proceedings of the 48th Annual Meeting of the European Association for Animal Production. Vienna (Austria), 25-28 August 1997. 5 pp.
Janssens S., Buys N., Vandepitte W. (2007) Sport status and the genetic evaluation for show jumping in Belgian sport horses. In: Proceedings of the 58th Annual Meeting of the European Association for Animal Production. Dublin (Ireland), 26-29 August 2007, 26-29
Klei L., Quaas R.L., Pollak E.J., Cunningham B.E. (1996) Multiple breed evaluation. In: Proceedings of Beef Improvement Federation 28th Annual Research Symposium and Annual Meeting. Birmingham, USA, pp. 93-105.
Koenen E.P.C. (2002) Genetic evaluations for competition traits of warmblood sport horses. Note presented at World Breeding Federation for Sport Horses seminar. Budapest (Hungary). 5 November 2002.
Koenen E.P.C., Aldridge L.I. (2002) Testing and genetic evaluation of sport horses in an international perspective. In: Proceedings of 7th World Congress Applied to Livestock Production. Montpellier (France), 19-23 August 2002, pp. 19-23.
Koenen E.P.C., Aldridge L.I., Philipsson J. (2004) An overview of breeding objectives for warmblood sport horses. Livest. Prod. Sci., 88, 77-84.
Legarra A., Bertrand J.K., Stradel T., Sanchez J.P., Misztal I. (2007) Multi-breed genetic evaluation in a Gelbvieh population. J. Anim. Breed. Genet., 124, 286-295.
Misztal I. (2012) BLUPF90 Family of Programs. University of Georgia, Athens, GA, USA (available at http://nce.ads.uga.edu/~ignacy/newprograms.html; last accessed at 21 March 2012).
Powell R.L., Sieber M. (1992) Direct and indirect conversion of bull evaluations for yield traits between countries. J. Dairy Sci., 75, 1138-1146.
Powell R.L., Wiggans G.R., VanRaden P.M. (1994) Factors affecting calculation and use of conversion equations for genetic merit of dairy bulls. J. Dairy Sci., 77, 2679-2686.
Quaas R.L., Zhang Z. (2006) Multiple-breed genetic evaluation in the US beef cattle context: methodology. In: Proceedings of 8th World Congress on Genetics Applied to Livestock Production. Belo Horizonte (Brazil). 13-18 August 2006, pp. 13-28.
Ricard A. (1997) Breeding evaluations and breeding programs in France. In: Proceedings of the 48th annual meeting of the European Association for Animal Production. Vienna (Austria), 25-28 August 1997, 9 pp.
Ruhlmann C., Bruns E., Fraehr E., Philipsson J., Janssens S., Quinn K., Thorén Hellsten E., Ricard A. (2009a) Genetic connectedness between seven European countries for performance in jumping competitions of warmblood riding horses. Livest. Sci., 120, 75-86.
Ruhlmann C., Janssens S., Philipsson J., Thorén Hellsten E., Crolly H., Quinn K., Manfredi E., Ricard A. (2009b) Genetic correlations between horse show jumping competition traits in five European countries. Livest. Sci., 122, 234-240.
Tavernier A. (1991) Genetic evaluation of horses based on ranks in competitions. Genet. Sel. Evol., 23, 159-173.
Tedeschi L.O. (2006) Assessment of the adequacy of mathematical models. Agric. Syst., 86, 225-247.
Vandenplas J., Gengler N. (2012) Comparison and improvements of different Bayesian procedures to integrate external information into genetic evaluations. J. Dairy Sci., 95, 1513-1526.
van Veldhuizen A.E. (1997) Breeding value estimation for riding horses in Netherlands. In: Proceedings of the 48th annual meeting of the European Association for Animal Production. Vienna (Austria), 25-28 August 1997, 8 pp.
Zhang Z.W., Quaas R.L., Pollak E.J. (2002) Simulation study on the effects of incorporating external genetic evaluations results. In: Proceedings of 7th World Congress on Genetics Applied to Livestock Production. Montpellier (France), 19-23 August 2002. Communication N°20-14 in CD.