Inheritance of faecal nematode egg count in Barbari goats following natural Haemonchus contortus infection

Genetic parameters for faecal nematode egg count were estimated in naturally infected Barbari goats maintained at the Central Institute for Research on Goats, Makhdoom, Mathura, India, over a period of 5 years (1999 through 2003). Faecal egg count (FEC) data on 891 records of Barbari goats descended from 69 bucks and 241 does were used in this study. Analyses were carried out by restricted maximum likelihood (REML), fitting an animal model and ignoring or including maternal genetic or permanent environmental effects. Three different animal models were fitted. Direct heritability estimates were inflated substantially for this trait when maternal effects were ignored. The direct heritability estimates for the trait ranged from 0.05 to 0.13 depending on the model used. Low (0.04) maternal heritability estimate was observed for this trait in our study. Moderate estimate of the fraction of variance due to maternal permanent environmental effects (c2) for faecal egg count (c2 = 0.10) was also observed. Results suggest that direct and permanent environmental maternal effects were important for this trait, however, maternal additive effects had less impact on this trait.