In a national survey of US dairy producers, only 2.7 +/- 0.5% of Holstein dairy operations reported achieving recommended target ranges of age < or = 24 months and body weight (BW) > or = 550 kg at first calving. Allowing for wider target ranges, still only 14.6 +/- 1.3% of Holstein dairy operations reported achieving age < or = 25 months and BW > or = 544.3 kg at first calving. Ages of individ...

The objective of this research was to estimate daily genetic correlations between longitudinal body condition score (BCS) and health traits by using a random regression animal model in first-lactation Holsteins. The use of indicator traits may increase the rate of genetic progress for functional traits relative to direct selection for functional traits. Indicator traits of interest are those th...

The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of milking frequency (three times daily vs. two times daily) on the lactation curve shape, partial and 305-d lactation performance in Holstein dairy cows in Iran. Data from February 2000 to December 2012 comprising 217345 lactations on 141364 cows distributed in 324 herds collected by the Animal Breeding Center of Iran were used. The mean milk...

Our objectives were 1) to compare reproductive performance across parity and lifetime performance in sow groups categorized by the number of pigs born alive (PBA) in parity 1 and 2) to examine the factors associated with more PBA in parity 1. We analyzed 476,816 parity records and 109,373 lifetime records of sows entered into 125 herds from 2008 to 2010. Sows were categorized into 4 groups base...

Vitamin E (Vit. E) is needed for young rabbits to prevent reproductive abnormalities, abortion and poor survivability of kits. Also, exogenous progesterone (P4) is needed for rabbits to enhance early embryonic development because of inadequate corpus luteum (CL) development at this age. Hence, the aim of this study was to investigate the effect of injecting Vit. E and the combination Vit. E+P4 ...

We extend bounds on the expressive power of firstorder logic over finite structures and over ordered finite structures, by generalizing to the situation where the finite structures are embedded in an infinite structure M , where M satisfies some simple combinatorial properties studied in model-theoretic stability theory. We first consider first-order logic over finite structures embedded in a s...