Published in Scientific Papers. Series D. Animal Science, Vol. LXV, Issue 1
Written by Genoveva STAYKOVA, Margarit ILIEV, Todor TSONEV, Georgi ANEV
Subject of the study were 678 sheep at 18 months from the North-East Bulgarian Merino breed, born in the period 2013-2019, ownership of the Scientific Agricultural Center - Targovishte. The following traits were analyzed: wool productivity, staple length, clean wool yield, clean fiber and tenderness of the fibers. The influence of the factors - year of birth, type of mating and breeding line was researched. The variance analysis was based on a multifactor linear statistical model. Year of birth had a highly significant influence of the studied traits. The average wool yield was 8.154 kg., staple length was 11.469 cm., average clean wool yield was 61.634 % and clean fiber was 5.101 kg. The genetic factors - selection type and breeding line had no significant effect on the traits for wool productivity. Heritability values for the studied traits were low which indicates a decrease of the genetic diversity and limited abilities for effective selection for increasing wool productivity.
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