Alpaca Journal

In order to breed alpacas with better and better fleece traits, we want to choose superior alpacas for our herds.  But how do we identify a “superior” alpaca?  Genetic superiority cannot be reliably estimated just by measuring an animal’s fleece traits or even by pedigree! Click here to read more.

By Mike Safley   

Every livestock breed has its legends.  Racing has Man O’ War and Bold Ruler; Aberdeen Angus breeders revere Old Jock; and Merino breeders remember Master Builder, a descendent of the great impact sire Majestic.  Alpacas of pedigree are a rather recent phenomenon.  We cannot reach back centuries or even decades for the icons of alpaca breed improvement.  The most famous alpaca herd sires are of recent vintage, some are still alive.

From Beyond the Bale, Issue 1, August 2002.  Australian Wool Inovation Limited - Selective Breeding at Pooginook

Pooginook, one of Australia's best-known Merino studs, says its breeding trials show that random mating, the industry's most common practice, is costing breeders time and money.

Read More

By
R.W. Ponzoni, R.J. Grimson, J.A, Hill, D. J. Hubbard, B.A. McGregor, A. Howse, I. Carmichael, and G.J. Judson

INTRODUCTION
Phenotypic and genetic parameters are part of the ‘building blocks’ required in the design of effective livestock genetic improvement programs.  There is currently no published information dealing with this aspect of alpacas in Australia, and very little worldwide.

In this paper, we report results of a preliminary analysis of young alpaca records, we compare them with other reports in the literature, and we comment on the likely implications of our findings.  We also contrast the alpaca phenotypic and genetic parameters with those derived from Merino sheep.

To read the complete study click here.

By M. Antonini, M. Gonzales and A. Valbonesi

The authors did field research into into follicular development in young llamas and alpacas.
The authors found that alpacas developed much higher follicular density than llamas.
Males and females, for all breeds, exhibited similar secondary to primary fiber ratios and skin densities.
Llamas seemed to attain their maximum scores at a later date than alpacas and the author found that unfavorable
environmental conditions could negatively effect maximum expression of follicular density.

Read the complete article here.Relationship between age and postnatal skin follicular development.pdf

The above link has been provided with permission from CSIRO and may not be reproduced in any format without further permission from CSIRO.

http://www.publish.csiro.au/journals/ajar

http://www.publish.csiro.au/journals/ajea

Related links:

• Correlations of Subjective Fleece Traits
• Fiber Testing Technology
• Incorporating Assessed Style, Length and Strength into Breeding Objectives for Fine and Superfine Merino Flocks
• How Reliable is Skin Based Assessment

By P. L. Hynd¹, R. W. Ponzoni² and J. A. Hill¹

This is a fascinating article about the relationship between skin traits and economically important fleece traits. Alpaca breeders who are taking skin biopsies and making selection decisions based on the secondary to primary fiber ratios and follicular density should read the entire article.

The authors found, contrary to popular opinion in the alpaca industry that follicular density in the skin does not necessarily correlate with higher fleece weights. For those of you who do not want to read the entire study, here is it’s conclusion.

The increases in genetic progress towards the breeding objective, which were conveyed by addition of some skin traits, while not spectacular, were of sufficient magnitude to suggest they may be usefully incorporated into some Merino selection programs, particularly those in which selected sires are likely to be used over a large number of ewes. The extra benefit obtained by including the skin traits was greater than that reported by other workers (Skerritt 1995; Purvis and Swan 1997). This may reflect differences in the genetic parameters established for the different strains and flocks (Tables 1 and 2), differences in the skin traits used, or both. For instance in the Finewool sheep the genetic correlation between follicle density and clean fleece weight was only 0.13 (Purvis and Swan 1997) whereas in the Strongwool sheep in our study the genetic correlation between density and fleece weight was 0.54. This may reflect real differences in the association between these characters in the two strains but may also reflect the fact that density was measured by two different methods in the two trials. However, in none of the selection exercises conducted to date using skin traits as selection criteria has there been evidence of spectacular increases in the rate of progress towards the breeding objective of increased fleece weight and decreased fibre diameter. Our results point to moderate additional gains but do not support suggestions that selection for skin traits will result in large changes in fleece quantity and quality. Note that this could be due to the specific sub-set of skin traits measured to date. It remains to be seen whether consideration of criteria based on the efficiency of fibre production at the follicle level, or on fibre composition, will result in more substantial increases in the efficiency of identification of superior wool producing genotypes.

Click here to read the entire article.

Related Links:

• What are EPDs?
• Methods for Measuring Microns
• Fiber Testing Technology
• The Case For Crimp
• The Studmaster Fleece Report
• Incorporating Assessed Style, Length, and Strength into Breeding Objectives for Fine and Superfine Merino Flocks
• Sources of Variations in Fibre Diameter Attributes of Australian alpacas and Implications for Fleece Evaluation and Animal Selection

by Sandra J. Welsman

The Australian Sheep Genetics System paper surveyed the current and historical status of the various sheep selection systems that are available to wool producers.  This is an extensive 57 page summary of what genetic selection systems are available to breeders.  Anyone interested in learning about Best Linear Unbiased Prediction (BLUP) will want to read this paper. The paper also speaks to across herd genetic improvement programs. The Table of Contents for the paper follows.

4 GENETICS SERVICES AND COMPATIBILITY

4.1 A range of genetics service providers

4.1.1 LAMBPLAN – Meat and Livestock Australia

a. Goals, markets and customers

b. Breeding – vision and results

c. Products, services, market response

4.1.2 Advanced Breeding Services – NSW Agriculture

a. Goals, breeding vision, products, markets

b. Industry Wether Trials – Bloodline comparisons

c. Merino Benchmark: across-stud

4.1.3 CSIRO – Select Breeding Services and databanks

4.1.4 Central Test Sire Evaluation - Merino

a. CTSE information and database

4.1.5 Other quantitative genetics service providers

a. Agriculture Western Australia

b. Natural Resources & Environment, Victoria

c. Mackinnon Project – University of Melbourne

d. SARDI

e. Independent consultants

4.1.6 Soft Rolling Skins and Elite Wool systems

a. Assessment: ‘elite wool’ methods in the marketplace

4.1.7 Professional sheep classers and stud advisors

4.1.8 Practical services – laboratories, scanners

4.2 Current services: methods and compatibility

4.2.1 Summary of sheep genetics data collections

4.2.2 Enterprises, pedigree, accuracy, links

4.2.3 Traits recorded, measurement and data integrity

4.2.4 Data collection, delivery, processing

4.2.5 Preparing BVs, indexes, comparisons, reports

Abbreviations and Glossary

To read this summary click here.

By D. Andrew Merriwether, Ph.D., and Ann M. Merriwether, Ph.D.

Much controversy and secrecy revolves around discussion and use of blue-eyed-white alpacas (BEWs) in breeding programs.  Blue-eyed white alpacas are all-white alpacas, with blue eyes, which are often (but not always) deaf.  Recently some alpaca farmers have suggested that the BEWs should not be used for breeding so this gene can be eliminated from the American alpaca gene pool. This suggestion reflects some of the misinformation that surrounds the issue of BEWs.

This article will discuss the genetics of BEWs. What we know about the genetics, given the paucity of reliable breeding data on the subject, is limited because some farms don’t acknowledge if their herdsire or dam has ever thrown a BEW, and relatively few BEWs are actually ARI registered (an when registered they are registered as white not BEW). Read more.

This series of articles and responses focuses on the debate between Australian sheep breeders regarding Jim Watts' Soft Rolling Skin Selection System.  This debate is relevant to alpaca breeders who are focusing on the virtue of selecting for alpacas with high follicular density skin.

The fundamental issue is whether selecting for high follicular density and high secondary to primary fiber ratios will create alpacas that are both fine and dense, or are these characteristics adversarial.  I wrote about these ideas in Ideal Alpacas from Myth to Reality.

The articles are from 1995, but the debate is still going on in Australia.

Click Here to read the articles.

I thought you might enjoy reading about linebreeding from the point of view of a rare horse breeder.

Undefeated in 14 runs and a sire supreme, Nearco was probably the best horse of the first half of the last century. Credited with undefeated Ribot as well, his breeder, Frederico Tesio, was probably the best breeder of that period.  The pedigree of both would be good places to look for anyone trying to unravel the mysteries of breeding a top thoroughbred, I thought one night long ago.

I recognized it for what it was in a nano-glance - a clinic in line breeding. It has since been my belief that horses will go on breeding in kind when returned to opposite sex strains of the gene pool from which they descend. Compounding, this is Olin Gentry's edict: "Return to the sire the best blood of his dam" - it is not clear where he learned, but Kentucky Derby winners strewn up and down Old Frankfort Pike will attest that learn he did.

These are the types of pedigrees we strive for in planned matings. Others take a different approach, often with good results. But until knowledge overtakes strongly held opinions based on observation, my two bucks are on linebreeding.

Click here to read the article.

Related Links:

• Pure Blood Part III

For those of you out there interested in mating Like to Like by pedigree this article may provide some insight.

One of the most compelling questions in Thoroughbred breeding is why an outstanding racehorse can fail as a stallion while others succeed.  If race record doesn't dictate success, what does?

To find an answer, a study was undertaken to see if there are any pedigree differences be

Conclusions

Given this study of composite successes and failures, we could draw several conclusions that might be used to predict which stallions will prove outstanding and which will be duds.

1. The stallion should have an inbred dam, and should have the relatively same percent of inbreeding as his dam.
2. A pattern should exist with a moderately inbred second dam, highly inbred dam, highly inbred foal.
3. The stallion should have the right kind of broodmare sire, i.e., a horse who is higher in male factors than female factors, and very low in female factors.

Click here to read the complete article.

Related Links:

• Nearco: A Primer in Linebreeding
• Pure Blood Part III

Did your breeding create a good nick?  I have always had good luck with repeating the breedings that resulted in superior breedings.  That’s called a “good nick” but the larger idea is to discover a “good nick” between blood lines or strains of pure bred animals.  Anne Peters’ article provides some interesting insights about how “good nicks” occur.

Just what the heck is a "nick" anyway?  Being curious as to where this term came from, the author consulted Webster's New Collegiate Dictionary and discovered that it actually had a genetic definition: "to complement one another genetically and produce superior offspring.”  Yup.  That about sums it up.  A nick is a cross of two bloodlines that seems to produce superior results.

Nicks have been around as long as there have been Thoroughbreds, and probably as long as there have been animal breeders.  Some of the earliest include the Godolphin Arabian crossed on daughters of The Bald Galloway, a cross that produced this foundation sire's most important offspring Lath, Cade, and Regulus (see Andrea Hoogendoorn's interesting article on Siblings.)  Lath and Cade were out of the same mare, Roxana, while Regulus was out of a second daughter of Bald Galloway named Grey Robinson.

Click here to read the article.

Why Inbreeding? Anne Peters answers her question in a clear minded objective fashion. Alpaca breeders who are interested in the potential of close breeding as well as the downside should take the time to read this article. It is published on The Pedigree Post, This is a great website with interesting ideas about animal breeding.

Click here to read the article.

Related Links:

• Nicks or Not
• Pure Blood Part III
• Nearco: A Primer in Linebreeding
• The Good, The Bad, and the Inbred: Why Stallions Succeed

A great site that contains a little of everything on the status of sheep breeding research. I want to warn you that the site contains 98 pages and many abstracts, so only dedicated researchers should click on this link. Association for the Advancement of Animal Breeding and Genetics

Only abstracts are available at this site, but most appear as short papers of 4 pages (longer for keynote papers) in the printed proceedings: so if something takes your interest, continue to information on ordering copies.

There are two ways that Huacaya breeders think about crimp in the United States. One group believes that crimp is not an important trait. The other camp says crimp is highly desirable. The show rings in all countries value crimp and many breeders around the world select for crimp. Is it important, or not?

Animal breeders are constantly faced with subjective decisions: Who to cull and who to keep. They often rely on subjective, type characteristics to make these decisions. If the type traits that they select for are positively correlated or linked to economically important characteristics then their decisions produce good results. If, on the other hand, these subjective decisions are negatively correlated to important traits the results can be harmful to the breed. Crimp in alpacas is a subjective, type trait. The first question is whether or not it is positively correlated to any important economic traits. If it is we should select for it; if not we should select against crimp or pay no attention to it at all. The second question, which may be more difficult to answer is, which crimp style or frequency is most preferable?

Click here to read the article.

Related Links:

1. Developing a Breeding Program
2. What Makes a Champion?
3. The Role of Crimp in the Textile Process