# Presentation: 230510

## Improving Animals Each Generation by Selecting from the Best Gene Sources

## The Next Generation

## Goals of Animal Breeders

**Provide the world’s food needs**
**Adapt animals to do new, more profitable jobs**
**Actual work (guide dog, draft horse)**
**Entertainment or companionship**
**Pharmaceutical production**
**Use modern selection tools**

## Natural Selection Tools

**Mother nature**** uses these tools:**
**Starve, thirst, or freeze to death**
**Injury, infection, or disease**
**Eaten by predators**
**Males battle each other for mates**
**Harmful mutations abort or kill young**
**Mother nature**** obeys the law of the jungle**

## Artificial Selection Tools

**Animal breeders**** use these tools:**
**Specialization of breeds and lines**
**Fence or barn or house**
**Import/export of genetic material**
**Artificial insemination, progeny test**
**Embryo transfer**
**Marker assisted selection**
**Animal breeders**** obey economic laws**

## Reproductive Tools

| Year | Tool | Name | Daugh-ters |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1953 | Frozen semen | Frosty |  |
| 1974 | Embryo transfer | Bova | 6,241 |
| 1982 | Embryo splitting | Divide,  Duplicate | 609 479 |

## Potential Future Tools

**X, Y sorted semen (already in use)**
**Embryo splitting (some use)**
**Adult cloning**
**Transgenics**
**Genomic selection (main focus of research)**

## Family Size

**Progeny test**
**Obtain 100 daughters of each bull**
**Measure important traits**
**Select the best bulls for further use**
**Descendants of ****1 bull**** (Elevation)**
**80,000**** daughters **
**2.3 million**** granddaughters**
**6.5 million**** great-granddaughters**

## History of Traits Evaluated

| Trait | Year Begun | Trait | Year Begun |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Milk, fat | 1935 | Size | 1983 |
| Protein | 1977 | Longevity | 1994 |
| Calving
ease | 1978 | Mastitis
resistance | 1994 |
| Udder | 1983 | Fertility | 2003 |
| Feet/legs | 1983 | Stillbirth | 2006 |

## Trait Emphasis – Dairy Selection

| Trait | Weight (%) | Trait | Weight (%) |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Protein | 23 | Udder | 6 |
| Fat yield | 23 | Feet/legs | 3 |
| Longevity | 17 | Size | −4 |
| Mastitis
resistance | 9 | Calving
ease | 2 |
| Fertility | 9 | Stillbirth | 4 |

**100%**

## Data Analysis

**National genetic rankings (dairy)**
**200 million**** monthly records of milk yield and other traits**
**30 million**** ****×**** ****30 million**** relationship matrix among cows and bulls**
**International genetic rankings**
**27**** countries on ****5**** continents**
**Combined ranking done in Sweden**

## Best BullO-Bee Manfred Justice

**Semen sales 198,000 units/year**
**Semen price $40/unit**
**Income ~$30 million to date**
**12,670 daughters already milking**
**10,401 in United States**
**590 in France, 570 in Italy, 400 in Denmark, 262 in the Netherlands, etc.**

## Justice Daughters vs. Average Cows

| Trait | Justice daughter | Average Holstein |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Milk (gallons/day) | 10.5 | 10.1 |
| Protein (lbs/day) | 2.82 | 2.62 |
| Cell count (1000/ml) | 231 | 288 |
| Productive life (mo) | 34.0 | 27.7 |
| Pregnancy rate (%) | 23.9 | 21.0 |
| Calving difficulty (%) | 3% | 8% |

## Computer Mating Programs

**For 5 million dairy cows, mate is selected by computer programs**
**Inbreeding avoided using ****pedigrees**
**Carriers of same ****defect**** not mated**
**Weak traits**** of cow matched to ****strong traits**** of bull**
**Sires with ****easy birth**** chosen for first calf**

## Milk Yield Progress

## Single Genes

**Some breeds ****horned**** (TX longhorn)**
**Other breeds 100% ****polled**** (Angus)**
**Wild bulls/cows needed horns**
**Genetic dehorning is easy**
**Polled (no horn) gene is dominant**
**Other genes are more valuable**

## Specialized Animals

**Cattle**
**Dairy****, not selected for meat quality**
**Beef****, not selected for milk quality**
**Chickens**
**Layers****, not selected for meat yield**
**Broilers****, not selected for egg yield**
**Global use of improved varieties**

## Breeding Companies

**Poultry, swine**
**Closed****, private breeding populations **
**Central control and vertical integration **
**Dairy, beef cattle**
**Open**** exchange of breeding stock**
**Producers choose using genetic rankings**
**Almost no patents or intellectual property**

## Animal vs. Vegetable Food Costs$ / 50 g protein needed daily

| Animal | Serv-ings | Cost ($) | Vegetable | Serv-ings | Cost ($) |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Eggs | 6 | 1.00 | Lentils | 5 | .30 |
| Milk | 6 | 1.40 | Peanut B. | 7 | .70 |
| Cheese | 7 | 1.90 | Rice | 17 | 1.00 |
| Hot dogs | 10 | 1.90 | Bread | 17 | 1.60 |
| Hamburger | 3 | 2.00 | Bananas | 38 | 2.75 |
| Chicken | 3 | 2.40 | Soyburger | 4 | 3.45 |
| Steak | 1 | 2.40 | Mixed nuts | 5 | 4.00 |

## Citizens Fed/AcreData from year 2000, 1 acre = .435 hectare

| Continent | Citizens (millions) | Farmland (acres) | Citizens/
acre |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Asia | 3,634 | 1,150 | 3.2 |
| Africa | 767 | 435 | 1.8 |
| Europe | 729 | 666 | 1.1 |
| N. America | 495 | 593 | .8 |
| S. America | 322 | 243 | 1.3 |
| Oceania | 30 | 127 | .2 |

## Conclusions

**People improve the genetic merit of their animals each generation**
**Selection tools make fast progress**
**Improving animal ****production**
**Improving animal ****health**
**Animal protein is very affordable**
**North America has few citizens**

## Acknowledgments

**Mel Tooker, Suzanne Hubbard, and Mark McGuire suggested several improvements**

## Picture Credits

| Bull or cow | Owner | Photographer |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Frosty | John & Melford Hill | ABS Global |
| Bova | Select Sires | Jack Remsberg |
| Duplicate, Divide | ABS Global | ABS Global |
| Elevation | Select Sires | Jack Remsberg |
| O. Man. Justice | Select Sires | Frank Robinson |
| De-Su Oman 6121  |  | John Erbsen |
| Feisty Fanny | TX Longhorn As. |  |