Variability in Linear Body Measurements and their Application in Predicting Body Weight of Afar Goats in Ethiopia.

ABSTRACT

Goats with their broad feeding habits, adaptation to unfavorable environment, low cost, suitability for small scale production and short reproduction put them at an advantage over cattle and sheep especially for resource poor livestock keepers. Body weight is mostly used to evaluate body development and carcass characteristics in animals. Meat animals visually assessed is a subjective method of judgment. In goats, objective evaluation of body weight and linear body measurements for describing and evaluating size and conformation characteristics can overcome problems associated with subjective evaluation. Hence, the objectives were a) to evaluate variability in linear body measurements b) to determine best fitted regression model for predicting live weight under field conditions. The study conducted in two districts of Afar National Regional State of Ethiopia used 800 random samples. The effect of district was significant (p<0.05) on body length, chest girth, whither height, pelvic width, and rump height, while body weight, horn length and ear length were non-significant. Sex effect was significant on body weight and other linear body measurements except pelvic width, ear length and rump height. The estimated regression model using a SAS macro, for predicting body weight, included linear effects of horn length, body length, chest girth, whither height, rump height and quadratic effect of chest girth.