Geoff Simm - Genetic Improvement of Farmed Animals

Genetic Improvement of Farmed Animals

Genetic Improvement of Farmed Animals

Geoff Simm

University of Edinburgh, UK

Geoff Pollott

Royal Veterinary College, London, UK

Raphael Mrode

Scotlands Rural College, Edinburgh, UK

and

International Livestock Research Institute, Nairobi, Kenya

Ross Houston

The Roslin Institute, University of Edinburgh, UK

Karen Marshall

International Livestock Research Institute, Nairobi, Kenya

CABI is a trading name of CAB International

Geoff Simm, Geoff Pollott, Raphael Mrode, Ross Houston and Karen Marshall 2021. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any form or by any means, electronically, mechanically, by photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owners.

References to Internet websites (URLs) were accurate at the time of writing.

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library, London, UK.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Simm, Geoff, 1959- author. | Pollott, Geoffrey, author. | Mrode, R. A., author. | Houston, Ross, author. | Marshall, Karen, author.

Title: Genetic improvement of farmed animals / Geoff Simm, Global Academy of Agriculture and Food Security, University of Edinburgh, UK, Geoff Pollott, Royal Veterinary College, London, UK, Raphael Mrode, Scotlands Rural College, Edinburgh, UK, and International Livestock Research Institute, Nairobi, Kenya, Ross Houston, The Roslin Institute, University of Edinburgh, UK, Karen Marshall, International Livestock Research Institute, Nairobi, Kenya.

Description: Wallingford, Oxfordshire, UK ; Boston, MA : CABI, [2020] | Includes bibliographical references and index. | Summary: Comprehensive, yet concise and approachable, Genetic Improvement of Farmed Animals provides a thorough grounding in the basic sciences underpinning current farmed animal breeding practice. The text relates science to practical application in all the major farmed animal species: cattle, sheep, goats, poultry, pigs and fish--Provided by publisher.

Identifiers: LCCN 2019054983 (print) | LCCN 2019054984 (ebook) | ISBN 9781789241723 (hardback) | ISBN 9781789241716 (paperback) | ISBN 9781789241730 (ebook) | ISBN 9781789241747 (epub)

Subjects: LCSH: Livestock--Genetic engineering. | Livestock improvement.

Classification: LCC SF756.5 .S56 2020 (print) | LCC SF756.5 (ebook) | DDC 636.08/21--dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019054983

LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019054984

ISBN-13:

9781789241723 (hardback)

9781789241716 (paperback)

9781789241730 (ePDF)

9781789241747 (ePub)

Commissioning Editor: Alexandra Lainsbury

Editorial Assistant: Lauren Davies

Production Editor: Tim Kapp

Typeset by SPi, Pondicherry, India

Printed and bound in the UK by Severn, Gloucester

Contents

The online resources referred to in the text can be found at: www.cabi.org/openresources/41723

Animal breeding has a long history, probably as long as domestication itself. Well before the current knowledge of genetics, people understood the importance of choosing the best animals to become parents and of avoiding unhealthy and aggressive animals. Darwin was fully aware of the achievements of animal breeders and used breeding of fancy pigeons as an analogy of natural selection. He even started breeding and crossing pigeons himself in his garden. It is also clear that breeding, moving hand-in-hand with major changes in both feeding and management, especially in the past half century or so, has had an enormous impact on animal production, leading to higher production efficiency and lower prices for the consumer.

Although the principles of breeding are easy to grasp, modern animal breeding methodology is anything but. For most important traits, there is continuous variation among animals and they generally do not fall into a few easily separated classes. Even if they do, for example, healthy and sick animals, the underlying reason is normally not a single malfunctioning gene. It is increasingly clear that most traits are affected by many genes and also by environmental factors. The task is no longer selecting the best animals to become parents, based on their own performance, but selecting as parents those animals that give the best progeny.

To resolve this, we need to collect large amounts of data on phenotypes and sometimes genotypes of farmed animal populations. To utilize these data sets we require sophisticated statistical methods, combined with well-designed software and substantial computing power. This makes learning animal breeding difficult for students, and also difficult for teachers, I might add. Although the underlying theory and methods are the same for all species, the structure of the industry and the animal populations, economic conditions, biological constraints and actual applications differ markedly between farmed animal species. Learning the theory without connecting it to real-life situations is not a recipe for success, especially not within agricultural sciences.

Therefore, it is with great pleasure I welcome the book on Genetic Improvement of Farmed Animals, by Geoff Simm, Geoff Pollott, Raphael Mrode, Ross Houston and Karen Marshall. This is an extensively updated and expanded edition of the previous book by Simm, which focused on cattle and sheep. Now there are completely new sections on poultry, pig, aquaculture and goat breeding. There is also new information on estimation of genetic variation and methods for phenotype recording, and chapters have been updated with the latest knowledge related to genomic evaluations. The book ends with an interesting discussion of the sustainability dimension of livestock production. So, in short, I am convinced that this book will make the lives of teachers and their students much easier!

Erling Strandberg

Professor of Animal Breeding and Genetics

Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, Uppsala

For over 10,000 years the fortunes of the human race have been closely intertwined with the husbandry of livestock. For much of this time, whether knowingly or unknowingly, livestock have been changed genetically by subjective means. Some of the scientific foundations for more objective genetic improvement methods were laid over 120 years ago, and others followed from the 1900s to the 1930s. However, it is only over the past 70 years or so that these have been applied to any great extent in livestock improvement. These objective methods are based on measurement of performance in economically important traits. To date they have been used most widely in pig, poultry and dairy cattle breeding, and to a lesser extent in beef cattle, sheep, goat and fish breeding. They have been used widely in industrialized countries, and much less so in lower-income countries.