Impact of conformation traits on functional longevity in South African Holstein cattle

2018 ◽  
Vol 58 (3) ◽  
pp. 481
Author(s):  
V. E. Imbayarwo-Chikosi ◽  
V. Ducrocq ◽  
C. B. Banga ◽  
T. E. Halimani ◽  
J. B. Van Wyk ◽  
...  

A proportional hazards model with a piecewise Weibull baseline hazard was used to determine the impact of observed scores for rump, udder, feet and leg traits on longevity. Conformation data of a total of 15 704 cows with either of or all 13 type traits for the period 1995–2013 were obtained from the Holstein Society of South Africa. Functional longevity was defined as the number of days from first calving to culling or censoring, adjusted for production. Type traits were fitted to the reference model one at a time. The model included the fixed time-dependent effect of region by year of calving, within-herd milk production class by year-season, number of lactations by stage of lactation by within-herd milk production class, protein and fat percent production class by year of calving, herd size by annual herd size change, fixed time-independent effect of age at first calving and presence of type record. Cows without type scores were 7–26% more likely to be culled than those with scores. Udder traits had the greatest impact on functional longevity. Fore teat placement had the strongest influence on functional longevity followed by udder depth, fore udder attachment, median ligament and rear treat placement. Rump and udder width had the least Chi-square contributions. Risk of culling was significantly higher for cows with very narrow chest, weak median ligament, extremely towed out teats and short rump height. There is potential for indirectly selecting animals for longevity based on udder type trait information.

2019 ◽  
Vol 59 (8) ◽  
pp. 1546
Author(s):  
Elisandra Lurdes Kern ◽  
Jaime Araujo Cobuci ◽  
José Braccini Neto ◽  
Darlene dos Santos Daltro

The objective of the present work was to evaluate the effect of somatic cell score on the longevity of Holstein cows raised all over Brazil, using a piecewise Weibull proportional-hazard model. The following two longevity traits were defined: true longevity, number of days from first calving to culling; and functional longevity, approximated by correcting true longevity to within-herd-year production. Records on productive life of 131330 cows were used. The model included the time-independent effect of age at first calving. The other effects were time-dependent, and included the following: region by year of calving, variation in herd-size class, milk-production class by year of calving within herd, within-herd milk-production class by number of lactations, within-herd fat content, within-herd protein content, and somatic cell score (SCS). The overall mean of the somatic cell counts (SCC) was 322000 cells/mL. The highest SCC mean was found between 130 to 290 days of lactation. The SCC mean decreased over the years. Cows from Region 5 (Rio Grande do Sul) showed higher SCC means. The risk of culling was slightly higher for functional longevity than for true longevity. The impact of longevity was high in cows from first to fourth lactation with a high SCS, with the risk of culling varying from 0.90 (true longevity: second lactation and Class 2) to 1.2 (functional longevity: fourth lactation and Class 5). Cows at the fifth lactation with a lower SCS had a higher risk of culling (1.4). Including the effect of SCS class by stage of lactation in the models was not beneficial. The decrease in SCS, especially from the first to fourth lactation, can be used for indirect selection to improve the longevity of Holstein cows in Brazil.


2013 ◽  
Vol 56 (1) ◽  
pp. 89-101
Author(s):  
S. Jovanovac ◽  
N. Raguž ◽  
J. Sölkner ◽  
G. Mészáros

Abstract. Genetic evaluation of sires for functional longevity was conducted using survival analysis techniques. The data set consisted of 49 659 Simmental cows with first calving from 1997 to 2008. A piecewise Weibull sire model was used to estimate breeding values of 251 bulls for functional length of productive life of their daughters. The model was stratified by parity i.e. a separate baseline hazard was computed for each stratum. Besides the random sire effect, the model included the fixed time independent effects of age at first calving, herd size and region as well as the time dependent effects of relative milk production and year*season of first calving. The highest impact on longevity was found for relative milk production. Cows with the lowest milk yields were at approximately 2.7 times higher risk of culling compared to cows with average milk production. Effects of age at first calving, herd size and country region had lower impact on longevity. Sire variance was 0.023 which results in a heritability of 0.06 for functional length of productive life. The average approximate reliability of estimated breeding values was 0.49. Genetic trend showed no clear tendency by year of birth of bulls.


2009 ◽  
Vol 54 (No. 12) ◽  
pp. 521-531 ◽  
Author(s):  
L. Zavadilová ◽  
M. Štípková ◽  
E. Němcová ◽  
J. Bouška ◽  
J. Matějíčková

The phenotypic relationships between type traits and functional traits were analyzed in 47 786 Czech Fleckvieh cows first calved from 1994 to 2003. Functional survival was defined as the number of days from first calving to culling. All the cows were scored for conformation during the first lactation. Type information consisted of phenotypic type scores for 17 objectively scored linear type traits (with 9 classes each) and of the measurements for 6 body traits (measured in cm). The impact of the chosen conformation traits on functional longevity was estimated using the Cox proportional hazards model. The statistical model included the combined time-dependent effects of lactation and stage of lactation, age of the first calving, effects of the herd of culling, effects of year-season of culling, effects of the first lactation milk yield calculated within herd-year deviation. Analysis was performed separately for each of 23 type traits. The relative culling risk was calculated for animals in each class after taking into account the previously mentioned effects. All the traits analysed showed a relationship with the functional survival. Among linear type traits, rump angle, body depth, rear legs side view and pastern, fore udder length, rear udder attachment, and teats traits exhibited an intermediate optimum. Height at the sacrum, muscularity, rump length, and rump width, hock, and hoof angle, central ligament, and udder depth tended toward a linear relationship to functional survival. Body measurement traits showed an almost linear relationship concerning longevity except for chest girth, which exhibited an intermediate optimum. Body measurement traits and body conformation traits had an impact on functional survival especially in extreme classes, e.g. extremely ascending rump. Larger, broader, muscular cows had a higher risk of being culled compared with smaller and narrower cows and, hence, a shorter length of productive live. Foot and leg traits had an important influence on functional longevity, especially rear legs side view and pastern. Among udder traits, fore udder length, rear udder attachment, and front teat placement showed a higher impact on cows’ longevity than the other analyzed udder traits.


2013 ◽  
Vol 56 (1) ◽  
pp. 797-807
Author(s):  
E. Strapáková ◽  
J. Candrák ◽  
P. Strapák ◽  
A. Trakovická

Abstract. Genetic evaluation of sires based on length of functional productive life of their daughters was carried out using a Weibull proportional hazard sire-maternal grandsire model. The data consisted of 214634 registered Slovak Simmental cows with censoring of 21.34%. Besides the random sire and maternal grandsire effects, the model included time dependent effects parity × stage of lactation interaction, within-herd standard deviations of milk production, herd × year × season interaction, change of herd size with respect to the previous year, and time independent effect age at first calving. Within-herd, the standard deviations of milk production had the most important influence on functional productive life. The highest risk of culling was found in cows with the lowest milk production class (uncompleted lactation). Risk of culling decreased with an increasing milk production class. Estimated heritability of functional productive life was 0.05 on the original scale. Breeding values of sires expressed as a risk ratio of their daughters were between −0.57 and 0.53.


Crisis ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 39 (1) ◽  
pp. 27-36 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kuan-Ying Lee ◽  
Chung-Yi Li ◽  
Kun-Chia Chang ◽  
Tsung-Hsueh Lu ◽  
Ying-Yeh Chen

Abstract. Background: We investigated the age at exposure to parental suicide and the risk of subsequent suicide completion in young people. The impact of parental and offspring sex was also examined. Method: Using a cohort study design, we linked Taiwan's Birth Registry (1978–1997) with Taiwan's Death Registry (1985–2009) and identified 40,249 children who had experienced maternal suicide (n = 14,431), paternal suicide (n = 26,887), or the suicide of both parents (n = 281). Each exposed child was matched to 10 children of the same sex and birth year whose parents were still alive. This yielded a total of 398,081 children for our non-exposed cohort. A Cox proportional hazards model was used to compare the suicide risk of the exposed and non-exposed groups. Results: Compared with the non-exposed group, offspring who were exposed to parental suicide were 3.91 times (95% confidence interval [CI] = 3.10–4.92 more likely to die by suicide after adjusting for baseline characteristics. The risk of suicide seemed to be lower in older male offspring (HR = 3.94, 95% CI = 2.57–6.06), but higher in older female offspring (HR = 5.30, 95% CI = 3.05–9.22). Stratified analyses based on parental sex revealed similar patterns as the combined analysis. Limitations: As only register-­based data were used, we were not able to explore the impact of variables not contained in the data set, such as the role of mental illness. Conclusion: Our findings suggest a prominent elevation in the risk of suicide among offspring who lost their parents to suicide. The risk elevation differed according to the sex of the afflicted offspring as well as to their age at exposure.


Author(s):  
C. Van der Geest

I am a 30-year-old sharemilker on my parent's 600 cow developing farm near Blackball on the western side of the Grey Valley. Earlier this year I competed in the National Young Farmer of the Year competition and finished a close third. So what is information? There are two types of information that I use. There is data gathered from my farm to help fine tune the running of the day to day operations on the farm And directional information This is the information that arrives in papers and directs the long-term direction and plans of the farm and farming businesses. Due to the variability in weather on the Coast there is a greater need to monitor and adjust the farming system compared to an area like Canterbury. This was shown last year (2001/02) when the farm was undergoing a rapid period of development and I was under time restraints from increasing the herd size, building a new shed as well as developing the farm. The results of the time pressure was that day to day information gathering was lower resulting in per cow production falling by 11% or around $182 per cow. So what information was lacking that caused this large drop in profit. • Pasture growth rates • Cow condition • Nitrogen requirements • Paddock performance • Milk production • Pre-mating heat detection As scientists and advisers I hear you say that it is the farmer's responsibility to gather and analyse this information. You have the bigger topics to research and discover, gene marking, improving pasture species, sexing of sperm and ideas that I have not even contemplated yet. This is indeed very valuable research. Where would farming be without the invention of electric fences, artificial breeding and nitrogen research? But my problem is to take a farm with below average production to the top 10% in production with the existing technology and farming principles. I have all the technical information I need at the end of a phone. I can and do ring my consultant, fertiliser rep, vet, neighbour and due to the size and openness of New Zealand science, at present if they do not know I can ring an expert in agronomy, nutrition, soils and receive the answer that I require. I hope that this openness remains as in a time of privatisation and cost cutting it is a true advantage. I feel that for myself the next leap in information is not in the growing of grass or production of milk but in the tools to collect, store and utilise that information. This being tied to a financial benefit to the farming business is the real reason that I farm. Think of the benefits of being able to read pasture cover on a motorbike instantly downloaded, overlaying cow intake with milk production, changes in cow weight, daily soil temperature and predicted nitrogen response. Telling me low producing cows and poor producing paddocks, any potential feed deficits or surpluses. This would be a powerful information tool to use. The majority of this information is already available but until the restraints of time and cost are removed from data gathering and storage, this will not happen.


2014 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 30-37
Author(s):  
Ashish Chandra ◽  
Dr. A. K. Dubey ◽  
Dr. Sachin Kumar Srivastava

This study covered 150 cooperative member milk producers and 150 non-member milk producers which were post- stratified into Landless, Marginal, small, medium and large herd size categories. Breakeven point is a point where no profit no loss status achieved where MR = MC. In this study breakeven point analysis was done to estimate the minimum quantity milk to be produced to cover the total cost on all categories (members and nonmembers) of households of milch animals (Cow and buffalo). And also in this study the researchers have find out the Total cost of milk production per liter for member and non member categories. This study is helpful to find out the total cost of milk production in all categories as well as members and nonmembers of dairy cooperative society are able to find out the breakeven point of the whole business.


Author(s):  
E. Smotrova ◽  
◽  
N. Abramova ◽  
V. Berezina ◽  
E. Krysova ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  

2017 ◽  
Vol 1 (28) ◽  
pp. 637-648
Author(s):  
Abbas Hassan Khlaty Al-Sray

The aim of present study was to detect the seroprevalence of Ostertagia ostertagi specific antibodies in cattle milk samples in Wasit province, by using the indirect ELISA test for first time in Iraq. For this purpose, an overall 368 dairies cow was submitted for study and the results were revealed that 51 (13.86 %) of tested cows were positive, and the mean optic density ratios (ODRs) of ELISA test values in seropositive cattle were 0.58. Also, this study aimed to investigate an association of seropositive results with some epidemiological risk factors. Hence, the positive results, according to these factors, were as follow: in milk production factor, 6.32 % for ³18 liters/day group, 14.29 % for ³10-18 liters/day group, and 25 % for < 10 liters/day group; in age factor, 13.41% for ³3-6 years group, and 14.75% for >6 years group; in breed factor, 18.27% for local breed group, 12.17% for cross-breed group, and 12% for pure breed group; in farm management factor, 21.35% for bad management group, and 5.68% for good management group; and in herd size factor, 11.59% for <25 (cow/herd) group, and 17.78% for ³ 25 (cow/herd) group. Statistically, the significant differences (P£ 0.05) were observed among related groups of milk production, breed, husbandry management, and herd size factors; while it’s not reported among groups of age factor.


2021 ◽  
pp. 109634802110160
Author(s):  
Dengjun Zhang ◽  
Jinghua Xie

Tourism seasonality negatively affects hotels’ operational and financial performance and then survival probabilities. Several studies have evaluated the impact of tourism seasonality on hotels’ exit risk. However, the empirical findings are ambiguous, probably due to the overall seasonality and different measures used in these studies. Against this background, this study explores the impact of tourism seasonality on hotel firms’ exit risk, using a proportional hazards model. We controlled for financial ratios, the main factors influencing the exit risk, and used two measures of tourism seasonality by market segment, namely, leisure, business, and conference tourism. The case study is the Norwegian hotel industry. The empirical results suggest that the different seasonal patterns of tourism demand in the market segments mitigate the impact of the overall seasonality on hotels’ exit risk, and that seasonality measures of various tourism segments affect the exit risk in different ways.


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