Estimativas de parâmetros genéticos para a produção de leite e idade ao primeiro parto em vacas da raça pardo-suiça utilizando amostrador de Gibbs

Abstract

Data from 2.981 lactations of Brown Swiss cows, from 62 herds, calving from 1980 to 2002, were used to check the influence of genetic and not genetic factors, on milk yield and age at first calving. An animal model used included the fixed effect of herds, age-season of calving and grade of cows, random effect of animal and temporary environment. For milk yield, in addition to the fixed effects described above, is also included the linear effect of lactation length and linear and quadratic effects of the age at first calving, as co-variables. Bayesian inference was used to estimate the components of (co) variance through of Gibbs sampling, the size of chain of 1,500,000 rounds and burn in 500,000 rounds. The frequency of sampling was 500 rounds. The estimated average for milk yield and age at first calving were 5347.471849.13 kg and 29,65  4,51 months respectively. The effects of herd, year of calving and lactation length, significantly influenced the production of milk (P <0.01). The age at first calving was influenced by the effects of herd, year of calving (P <0.01), beyond the end of season of calving (P <0.05). The heritability estimates obtained for the milk yield and age at first calving were e 0.23 and 0.18, respectively. The genetic correlation was -0.31. The genetic and phenotypic trend for milk yield was 1.09 kg and 115.34 kg of milk, respectively, for each year of production. For age at first calving, the values of genetic breeding have become negative from 1988, with reduction of approximately 0.05 months of each year and there was a reduction of 32 to 28 months of age at first calving. Daughters of sires with a high genetic value for milk tend to have faster growth or physiological maturity at a very early age, reducing the age at first calving.