An analysis of maternal performance and litter preweaning traits was carried out on 817 purebred Bauscat, Giza White, White Flander and Baladi Red litter records including 491 does mated to 122 bucks. Traits investigated involved gestation length (GL), litter size at birth (LSB) and at weaning (LSW), preweaning litter mortality (PM) and litter sex ratio at weaning (SRW). Breed effects on GL, PM and SRW were not significant, while they were significant for LSB and LSW. Year of kindling affected significantly GL, LSB and PM. No pattern of parity and month of kindling effects on most of litter traits were observed. The mating buck contributed significantly to the variance of GL and PM while a little or no effects on LSB, LSW and SRW were detected. Differences due to doe effects in maternal performance and litter preweaning traits were highly significant with the exception of PM. Estimates of repeatability for doe litter traits studied were low in magnitude. GL was little related to other litter traits studied while LSB and LSW were highly positively correlated. |
