Influence of number of daughters per sire on genetic evaluation of Mehsana Buffalo bulls under field progeny testing

First lactation production records of 7,825 Mehsana buffaloes, sired by 200 sires maintained at Dudhsagar Research and Development Association, Dudhsagar Dairy, Mehsana over a period of 25 years (1989-2013), were utilised for estimation of breeding value of the first lactation milk yield using BLUP - Univariate sire model and animal model using WOMBAT software. The study aimed to find out the optimum number of daughters that may be sufficient for more accurate and unbiased estimate of breeding value of Mehsana buffalo bulls. The effectiveness of different models run with different daughters per sire for sire evaluation was judged on the basis of within-sire variance. The maximum and minimum estimated breeding values were 1924.04 l (BLUP-AM, 5 daughters/sire) and 1855.61 l (BLUP-SM, 30 daughters/sire), respectively. However, error variance estimated was highest when five daughters/sire were evaluated and lowest, when 30 daughters/sire were evaluated. The present study revealed that the sire evaluation with sires having minimum 5, 10 and 15 daughters are equally efficient. However, if we do evaluation with sires having daughters more than 20, 25 or 30, additional accuracy of approximately 2.5%, 3% and 5%, respectively may be obtained.