Application of monthly test-day milk yield in Murrah buffalo

In the present study buffalo herds of Murrah breed at various centres are studied to evaluate the sires on the basis of as many daughters as possible. The data pertaining to first lactation monthly test-day milk yield (FLMTDMY) and first lactation 305-days or less milk yield (FL305DMY) of 1,105 Murrah buffalo during 1993 to 2010 at National Dairy Research Institute, Karnal (NDRI); Central Institute for Research on Buffalo, Hisar (CIRB); Guru Angad Dev Veterinary and Animal Sciences University, Ludhiana (GADVASU) and Choudhary Charan Singh Haryana Agricultural University, Hisar (CCSHAU) were collected and adjusted against significant environmental influences. In the present study FLMTDMY and FL305DMY were significantly affected by farm. First lactation records of 832 Murrah buffalo were used for evaluating 95 sires used in 7 sets. First lactation monthly test-day 6 milk yield (FLMTD6MY) had the highest genetic (0.99 +/- 0.04) and phenotypic (0.78 +/- 0.02) correlation with FL305DMY in Murrah buffaloes. An attempt was being made in the present investigation to estimate and compare the estimated breeding values (EBVs) of Murrah bulls through different sire evaluation methods, viz, contemporary comparison (CC), least-squares (LS), simple regressed least-squares (SRLS) and best linear unbiased prediction (BLUP) for FLMTDMY. The rank correlations among all the 4 methods of sire evaluation were highly statistically significant. BLUP method was found to be more efficient, accurate and stable with lowest genetic variation.