AbADjievA, D., M. Chervenkov, r. StefAnov, n. MetoDiev, e. kiStAnovA, D. kAChevA and e. rAyChevA, 2014. effect of breeding season on the kinematic parameters and morphology of ram’ sperm from synthetic population bulgarian milk sheep breed. Bulg. J. Agric. Sci., 20: 967-972 the aim of this study was the investigation of the breeding season effect on the kinematic and main spermatological parame...

East Friesian-sired F1 ewe lambs (n = 27) and Lacaune-sired F1 ewe lambs (n = 31) born in 1999 were compared for lamb production, lactation performance, and udder morphology traits in a dairy sheep production environment in 2000. The ewe lambs were the progeny of seven East Friesian and five Lacaune sires. A contemporary group of high percentage East Friesian ewe lambs (> 3/4 East Friesian, n =...

Sources of variation in Finnish Landrace and Targhee birth weights from pregnancies following natural matings and intra-breed, inter-breed and 2-breed embryo transfers were studied. Birth weights were recorded on 94 lambs from naturally mated ewes and 117 transfer lambs. Two analyses were done, one on observed weights, and one on deviations of observed weights from weights predicted from litter...

The National Scrapie Plan (NSP) was launched in Great Britain in 2001, with the aim of eventually eradicating scrapie, a small ruminant transmissible spongiform encephalopathy, from the national sheep flock. Specifically, a selective breeding programme, the Ram Genotyping Scheme, was devised enabling pedigree ram breeders to reduce the number of scrapie-susceptible genotypes from their flocks. ...

Pedigree information was analyzed in 7 small populations of sheep raised in France (Bleu du Maine, Charmoise, Cotentin, on-farm Romanov, Romanov ex situ in vivo, Roussin de la Hague, Solognote) to estimate their genetic variability. The pedigree information for each breed, estimated by the number of equivalent generations traced, ranged from rather poor (4.6) to very good (10.5) when compared w...

This study evaluated the differences in the muscle-fat-bone yield of Namaqua Afrikaner (NA), Dorper (D) and SA Mutton Merino (SAMM) ram lambs. The breeds constituted an indigenous, hardy and late maturing, fat-tailed breed (NA), an early maturing, commercial meat breed (D) and a late maturing commercial dual-purpose breed (SAMM). Lambs were slaughtered at 35 (± 8) days post weaning. Carcasses w...

The effects of food quality, breed type and sex (ram and ewe) on lamb growth and carcass composition, and their changes throughout growth, were measured. The three breed types were Scottish Blackface (B; no. = 24), Suffolk (S; no. = 28) and their reciprocal crosses (X; no. 33). The lambs had free access to a nutritionally non-limiting food, H, or a bulky food, L. Each lamb was scanned using X-r...

Background: Seminal plasma of mammals is a complex fluid, which serves as a carrier for the spermatozoa on their journey from the male testes to their target, the oocyte. Seminal plasma contains a variety of biochemical components, some of which are relatively specific for the regulation of sperm function. The objective of this study was to investigate enzyme activities aspartate-amino-transfer...