Abstract Canadian and United States evaluations of Holstein bulls were compared for longevity and somatic cell score. A total of 13 236 bulls was evaluated for longevity with 462 bulls having evaluations in both countries, and 10 945 bulls evaluated for somatic cell score with 564 bulls having evaluations in both countries. Multiple across country evaluation procedures were used to estimate the genetic correlations between countries, and to evaluate all bulls on each country&apos;s scale of expression. The genetic correlation for longevity (calculated and expressed differently in each country) was 0.91, and for somatic cell score was 0.93, which were as high as correlation estimates for production traits between many countries. The correlation between the international evaluation and the original Canadian evaluations were 0.971 for functional herdlife and 0.981 for somatic cell score, and for the United States were 0.999 and 0.997, respectively. International comparisons of bulls for traits other than production and conformation are feasible

F Grignola

L R Schaeffer

CiteSeerX

Livestock Production Science 65 (2000) 161–165
www.elsevier.com/ locate / livprodsci
Relationships between evaluations of Canadian and USA
Holstein bulls for longevity and somatic cell score
1 *F. Grignola , L.R. Schaeffer
Centre for Genetic Improvement of Livestock, Department of Animal and Poultry Science, University of Guelph, Guelph, ON,
Canada N1G 2W1
Received 1 June 1999; received in revised form 23 September 1999; accepted 4 October 1999
Abstract
Canadian and United States evaluations of Holstein bulls were compared for longevity and somatic cell score. A total of
13 236 bulls was evaluated for longevity with 462 bulls having evaluations in both countries, and 10 945 bulls evaluated for
somatic cell score with 564 bulls having evaluations in both countries. Multiple across country evaluation procedures were
used to estimate the genetic correlations between countries, and to evaluate all bulls on each country’s scale of expression.
The genetic correlation for longevity (calculated and expressed differently in each country) was 0.91, and for somatic cell
score was 0.93, which were as high as correlation estimates for production traits between many countries. The correlation
between the international evaluation and the original Canadian evaluations were 0.971 for functional herdlife and 0.981 for
somatic cell score, and for the United States were 0.999 and 0.997, respectively. International comparisons of bulls for traits
other than production and conformation are feasible.  2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.
Keywords: International comparisons; Longevity; Somatic cell score
1. Introduction through the Holstein Association of America. There
are traits other than production and conformation
International comparisons of dairy bulls for pro- which are also of economic importance. Two of
duction traits have been computed by Interbull for these are longevity and somatic cell score (SCS).
nearly five years including over 20 countries. Re- Longevity evaluations give information about in-
cently, international comparisons for conformation voluntary culling of bulls’ daughters, and SCS
traits have been the subject of a trial run by Interbull evaluations are indirect indicators of potential mas-
titis problems.
The United States began national evaluation sys-
*Corresponding author. Tel.: 11-519-8244-120; fax: 11-519- tems for these traits in January 1994. SCS evalua-
7670-573.
tions, (USCS), are based on the mean of all test dayE-mail address: lrs@sherlock.aps.uoguelph.ca (L.R. Schaeffer)
1 measures within a lactation, which are adjusted forFacultad de Agronomia-UBA, Departamento de Zootecnia, Av.
San Martin 4453, 1417 Buenos Aires, Argentina. lactation length within parities (Schutz, 1994).
0301-6226/00/$ – see front matter  2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.
PI I : S0301-6226( 99 )00171-2
162 F. Grignola, L.R. Schaeffer / Livestock Production Science 65 (2000) 161 –165
Evaluations are expressed as predicted transmitting half-sibs and other relatives that have proofs in just
abilities with the mean SCS of first lactation cows one country. The multiple across country evaluation
born during 1985 added. Productive life (PL), is model (MACE) of Schaeffer (1994) can accommo-
defined as a measure of lactation length (10 months date all bulls that are related in different countries
per lactation) and limited to the first 7 years of life. through common sires and grandsires.
Evaluations are expressed as deviations from an The objectives of this study were to apply the
average cow born in 1985 (VanRaden and Wiggans, MACE methodology to evaluations of Holstein bulls
1995). PL reflects the time from first calving to for longevity and SCS from Canada and the US, to
disposal and is not adjusted for the production level re-estimate the genetic correlation between countries,
of the cow, but does include a contribution from and to derive conversion formulas for animals not
linear type traits. Details about how the type traits included in the MACE analysis.
were incorporated into the PL evaluations were not
available.
Canada began evaluations for these two traits in 2. Materials and methods
January 1996. SCS evaluations, (CSCS), are based
on a three lactation test day model, and the resulting The official evaluations for longevity and SCS
evaluations for each lactation are combined and from Canada and the US were obtained from July
expressed relative to a mean of 3.00 (Reents et al., 1996. The evaluation systems have been described
1995) as estimated transmitting abilities. A three above. Bulls were required to have a minimum
lactation multiple trait model for functional herd life reliability of 50% within a country, daughters re-
that includes adjustments for fat and protein pro- cords from 20 or more herds, and 20 or more
duction levels of the cow is used (Jairath et al., 1998) daughters per bull. Some details on the bulls in-
to give a direct measure of herd life, and an indirect cluded in the study are shown in Table 1. Note that
measure of herd life is predicted from conformation the bulls in each country have similar average
traits. The official herd life (HL) evaluation is the number of daughters and herds for longevity evalua-
combination of the direct and indirect measures tions, but SCS evaluations showed slightly more
which are weighted depending on the amount of information from US bull evaluations. The assumed
information in each. Note that HL includes an heritabilities for the within country evaluations were
adjustment for production level while PL does not, 0.030 and 0.085 for HL and PL, respectively, and
and both evaluations include some contribution from were 0.09 and 0.10 for CSCS and USCS, respective-
type traits in that country. There are advantages and ly.
disadvantages of each kind of evaluation as dis- The Canadian evaluation system for longevity was
cussed by Powell et al. (1997).
The simplest way to compare Canadian and US Table 1
bulls for these traits is to compute a conversion Details about bulls included in the study
formula such as Powell et al. (1997). They used Trait Canada USA
bulls that were born since 1975, had daughter
Longevityinformation in 20 or more herds (in both countries)
No. of bulls 3747 9489
and a reliability greater than 50% to derive the Mean reliability 85 66
conversion formulas. For longevity, 433 bulls had Average No. herds 149 143
Birth years 1955–1990 1980–1991evaluations in both Canada and the US and these
Average No. daughters 324 326gave a correlation between HL and PL of 0.60. For
SCS, 354 bulls with evaluations in both countries
Somatic cell scores
gave a correlation between USCS and CSCS of 0.82. No. of bulls 2980 7965
For bulls initially proven in Canada, the correlations Mean reliability 77 71
Average No. herds 114 140were 0.64 for longevity (based on 258 bulls) and
Birth years 1958–1992 1980–19910.77 for SCS (based on 182 bulls). This methodolo-
Average No. daughters 203 323gy, however, does not consider the hundreds of
F. Grignola, L.R. Schaeffer / Livestock Production Science 65 (2000) 161 –165 163
based on the production data files that date back to the vector of sire effects for m countries, then
1957, and hence bulls date back to 1955. The Var(s) 5 A ^ G
evaluation system for SCS was based on test day
where G is an m by m matrix of sire variances on therecords from 1987, but a few old bulls managed to
diagonals and sire covariances between countries onmeet the daughter and herd restrictions for inclusion
the off-diagonals. The matrix D is diagonal andin this study. The HL and SCS bull proof files from i
contains information related to the reliability of eachthe US were limited to bulls born from 1980
bulls’ evaluation within country i, such as number ofonwards regardless of the data included in their
effective progeny. Each country provides values forevaluation systems. A routine international compari-
s , for D , and the assumed heritability of the trait.son analysis may need to put restrictions on birth- i i
Deregressed evaluations, y , were calculateddates of bulls, but none were imposed on this study. i
separately for each country as described by RozziThe mean reliabilities for longevity were higher in
and Schaeffer (1996). At the same time sire andCanada than in the US although the average number
residual variances were estimated as described byof daughters and herds was the same and the
Schaeffer (1994) assuming that heritability washeritability was lower in Canada. For US bulls, the
constant. Genetic correlations between countriesmaximum and standard deviation of number of herds
were estimated as given by Schaeffer (1994) whichper bull were much greater than in Canada which
used the method of Calo et al. (1973). That is, theapparently contributed to the lower mean reliability
actual correlation between evaluations for sires withof bulls in the US. There could also be differences
sons in both countries was divided by the expectedbetween countries in the approximation methods
correlation based on the reliabilities.used to compute reliabilities. Details on these ap-
Genetic evaluations were computed using MACEproximations were not compared.
methodology for all bulls in the data. Hence evalua-The model for the MACE methodology has been
tions were obtained for all US and Canadian bullsdescribed by Schaeffer (1994) as
expressed on each country’s scale. That is, all bulls
y 5 m 1 1 Z Qg 1 Z s 1 ei i i i i i i in the analysis of longevity, for example, had both an
HL and a PL evaluation. From these evaluations,where
conversion formulas could be computed which
would allow the conversion of evaluations on cowsy is a vector of deregressed sire evalua-i
from one country to another, if necessary.tions from country i
m is the average evaluation for country ii
for the bulls included in the analysis
3. Results and discussiong is a vector of unknown parent genetici
groups
The estimates of sire and residual variances fors is a vector of sire genetic values (eitheri
longevity and SCS for US and Canada are given inbreeding values or transmitting abilities),
2 Table 2. The estimates were derived assuming theVar(s ) 5 Asi s i
Table 2and
Estimates of sire and residual variances
2Var(s ) 5 Asi s i Trait Canada USA
Longevityand
Sire variance 0.067 2.293
2 Residual variance 8.880 105.608Var(e ) 5 D si i ei
Somatic cell scores
If Sire variance 0.072 0.053
Residual variance 3.119 2.0799 9 9s s ? ? ? ss9 5s d1 2 m
164 F. Grignola, L.R. Schaeffer / Livestock Production Science 65 (2000) 161 –165
Table 3heritabilities from each country were the true values,
Formulas for converting evaluations expressed in USA (Canada)and were subsequently utilized in MACE evaluation.
to an equivalent expression in Canada (USA)
HL and PL were obviously expressed on different
Trait Intercept1b3evaluationscales while SCS was measured in the same manner
in both countries. These variances and the estimated Longevity
HL 20.0191(0.1483PL)genetic correlations between US and Canada are
PL 0.1351(6.3983HL)critical to the MACE evaluations. Much effort has
been directed towards the development of better Somatic cell scores
methods to estimate these parameters. The estimated CSCS 20.2351(1.0233USCS)
genetic correlation between HL and PL was 0.91, USCS 0.6761(0.8303CSCS)
and between USCS and CSCS was 0.93. The genetic
correlation estimates from this study were substan-
tially higher than those of Powell et al. (1997). The in the MACE analyses and are given in Table 3.
difference between estimates is due to the difference These formulas only apply to the July 1996 evalua-
of information going into each estimate. In Powell et tions. From Powell et al. (1997) the formula to
al. (1997), only bulls with highly reliable evaluations convert Canadian CSCS evaluations to the US scale
in both US and Canada were included. In this study, was
the correlation was estimated from bulls with sons USCS 5 0.64 1 (0.836 3 CSCS)
and grandsons in both countries, which gives more
which is very similar to the formula shown in Tableties between countries. The higher correlation esti-
3 from this study.mates mean that MACE can be used for both
longevity and SCS for these two countries, which
would be superior to the use of conversion formulas.
A conversion formula implies that bulls rank identi- 4. Conclusions
cally in both countries. MACE allows and provides
evaluations specific to each country, and bulls do not MACE should be the preferred methodology for
have to rank identically in each country. combining trait evaluations from different countries.
The MACE evaluations for HL were correlated This study demonstrated that MACE could be suc-
with the original Canadian HL evaluations at 0.971, cessfully applied to longevity and SCS. This work
while for the US the correlation was 0.999. For SCS, would need to be repeated because Canada changed
the correlation between CSCS and MACE evaluation to a multiple lactation, multiple trait, random regres-
on the Canadian scale was 0.981, while for the US sion test day model for production traits and somatic
the correlation was 0.997. There was virtually no cell scores simultaneously, in February 1999. This is
difference between the original US evaluations for not a big difference from the previous fixed regres-
PL and USCS and the MACE evaluations on the US sion test day model for SCS alone, but heritability is
scale. Canadian MACE evaluations, however, slightly higher in the random regression test day
seemed to benefit from the additional information model because of the positive correlations of SCS
coming from the US. with production traits. Canada is also considering
Looking at the MACE evaluations on the Cana- changes to evaluations of longevity (Boettcher et al.,
dian scale, in the top 100 bulls for CSCS, 90 were 1999).
bulls of US origin, and for HL 82 were bulls of US If other countries were to be included with Canada
origin. In the top 100 of the MACE evaluations on and the US, then genetic correlations between them
the US scale, 100 were of US origin for USCS and could be much lower depending on the definition of
97 were of US origin for PL. Thus, rankings in herd life and the method of analysis in each country.
Canada and US were not equivalent, but were very The correlations could also depend on how well
similar, which reflects the high, but less than unity reasons for disposal are recorded in each country.
genetic correlations for these traits. There should be fewer problems with SCS, but some
Conversion formulas were derived from all bulls countries record and evaluate actual mastitis inci-
F. Grignola, L.R. Schaeffer / Livestock Production Science 65 (2000) 161 –165 165
daughters in the first three lactations. J. Dairy Sci. 82, 1034–dence and the correlations with SCS may be very
1044.much lower (Lund et al., 1999). Countries that
Calo, L.L., McDowell, R.E., Van Vleck, L.D., Miller, P.D., 1973.
record and evaluate both mastitis incidence and SCS Genetic aspects of beef production among Holstein–Friesians
should be able to provide information on the correla- pedigree selected for milk production. J. Anim. Sci. 37, 676–
tion between these two traits. Perhaps a multiple trait 682.
Jairath, L.K., Dekkers, J.C.M., Schaeffer, L.R., Liu, Z., Burnside,MACE procedure that includes both mastitis and
E.B., Kolstad, B., 1998. Genetic evaluation for herd life inSCS evaluations from one country, merged with
Canada. J. Dairy Sci. 81, 550–562.
either mastitis or SCS evaluations from other coun- Lund, M.S., Jensen, J., Petersen, P.H., 1999. Estimation of genetic
tries should be developed. and phenotypic parameters for clinical mastitis, somatic cell
production deviance, and protein yield in dairy cattle using
Gibbs sampling. J. Dairy Sci. 82, 1045–1051.
Powell, R.L., VanRaden, P.M., Wiggans, G.R., 1997. RelationshipAcknowledgements
between United States and Canadian genetic evaluations of
longevity and somatic cell score. J. Dairy Sci. 80, 1807–1812.
The authors gratefully acknowledge the provision Reents, R., Dekkers, J.C.M., Schaeffer, L.R., 1995. Genetic
of evaluations from the Canadian Dairy Network and evaluation for somatic cell score with a test day model for
multiple lactations. J. Dairy Sci. 78, 2858–2870.from the Animal Improvement Programs Laboratory,
Rozzi, P., Schaeffer, L.R., 1996. New deregression proceduresUSDA, Beltsville, MD, USA. Financial support from
used on type traits. Interbull Workshop, Verden.
the Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Schaeffer, L.R., 1994. Multiple country comparison of dairy sires.
Affairs, the Cattle Breeding Research Council, and J. Dairy Sci. 77, 2671–2678.
the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Schutz, M.M., 1994. Genetic evaluation of somatic cell scores for
United States dairy cattle. J. Dairy Sci. 77, 2113–2120.Council of Canada are acknowledged.
VanRaden, P.M., Wiggans, G.R., 1995. Productive life evaluations:
calculation, accuracy and economic value. J. Dairy Sci. 78,
631–638.
References
Boettcher, P.J., Jairath, L.K., Dekkers, J.C.M., 1999. Comparison
of methods for genetic evaluation of sires for survival of their


Relationships between evaluations of Canadian and USA Holstein bulls for longevity and somatic cell score.

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Relationships between evaluations of Canadian and USA Holstein bulls for longevity and somatic cell score.

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