Body Weight Prediction in Nigeria Goats using Body Measurements of Different Age, Sex and Breeds

Abstract

Data collected from 900 goats sampled from Borno, Sokoto and Ogun States from three different breeds on the following metric characters: Body Weight (BW), Age, Horn Length (HL), Ear length (EL), Shoulder width (SW), Neck circumference (NC), body length (BL), Withers Height (WH), Heart Girth (HG), Pouch Girth (PG), Tail Length (TL) and Scrotal circumference (SC) were subjected to stepwise multiple linear regression. Results obtained showed Live weight changes with body measurements were poorly to highly predictable with R² values ranging between 0.000 - 0.031 in animals < 1 year old, 0.000-0.241in animals 1-2 years and 0.000-0.658 in animals 2 years and above. It was thus concluded that the low, moderate and high predictive power obtained from this study might be due to instability of regression coefficient at different ages and points also to decreasing environmental impact on growth with increase in age.