Abstracto
- Body conformation is a physical attribute that describe all important areas of an animal's body and its used as a fundamental part of the selection process, since it can be a good indicator of the size, composition and structure of the body as well as breed quality. The objective was to evaluate the relationships of conformation traits (VO) of Blanco Orejinegro cattle (BON) dams, using structural equation modeling (SEM). Twenty VO in 982 lactating BON dams from different herds in Colombia were analyzed. An SEM was used including latent variables (VL) or body scores for structure, musculature, feet and legs, udder and body balance (E, M, P, U and B, respectively). The VO variables with the greatest influence in E, P and U were, respectively: thoracic depth, rear angle and udder depth, with loading factors (cf) of 0.85, 0.89 and 0.64, and for M the conformation of the leg and arm thickness (with cf greater than 0.84). The E, M and U were related to B (path coefficients greater than 0.70). It was concluded that the VO influenced their respective body compound differently and relationships between compounds and variables should be taken into account when body conformation of BON dams is evaluated. © 2022 Fundacion CIPAV. All rights reserved.
