Recipient Organization
MONTANA STATE UNIVERSITY
(N/A)
BOZEMAN,MT 59717
Performing Department
Animal & Range Sciences
Non Technical Summary
The U.S. sheep industry is approximately 100,000 farms located in all 50 states which are valued at just over $700 million. Montana is ranked 8th in terms of breeding sheep (171,000) and value of sheep within the United States. The sheep industry has been declining in recent years, losing ground to imported product from Australia and New Zealand. NC-214 is the only multi-state research project that is focused on all aspects of increasing efficiency of sheep production. Through this work, research will be conducted to improve the livelihoods of US sheep producers through new management techniques, better genetic selection, improved animal health, and increased efficiency overall.The MSU component of the NC214 research project will help accomplish parts of objectives one, two, and three. In objective one, MSU will assist by determining optimum timings for artificial insemination in sheep as well as determine optimal development strategies to improve overall ewe productivity. Objective two will be achieved through feed intake trials conducted at Ft. Ellis which will allow producers to produce the same amount of product with fewer resources, improving the long-term sustainability of the Montana sheep industry. Production data will also be used to better refine selection techniques such as improved indexes. Finally, longevity will be measured through udder scores, mouth scores, and other traits that can be measured in a research flock. Again this would increased the long-term sustainability by reducing replacement costs to a producer and ensuring a ewe is a profitable as possible. Overall MSU will contribute to three objectives which are all designed to improve the livelihoods of sheep producers within Montana and across the United States.
Animal Health Component
70%
Research Effort Categories
Basic
15%
Applied
70%
Developmental
15%
Goals / Objectives
Develop and evaluate methods to improve reproductive efficiency.
Develop strategies to improve efficiency of lean lamb growth and meat quality.
Evaluate genetic resources, nutrient requirements and production systems for lamb, wool and milk production.
Project Methods
Objective 1.2 Male fertility optimization for artificial insemination. Pending funding, we will help establish optimum timings for artificial insemination in fine-wool rangeland sheep. This will involved a subset of ewes being synchronized for estrus and bred at varying times to determine the timing which achieves the highest rate of success.Objective 1.3: Optimizing ewe lamb development programs for improved reproductive efficiency of flock. We will assist in generating the dataset for ewe lamb productivity. Depending on resources available within the MSU flock we may be able ot breed ewe lambs at 7 months of age and follow them through their lifetime production to generate information on the necessary steps to ensure optimal ewe lamb development for increased reproductive efficiency.Objective 2.2: Evaluating feed efficiency indicators for use in the National Sheep Improvement Program. Using the GrowSafe system at Ft. Ellis we will assist in sampling Rambouillet and Targhee sheep for measuring feed intake, feed conversion ration, and residual feed intake. In the long term, the genetic connectedness of the Rambouillet and Targhee flocks at MSU will allow this data to be useful for stakeholder flocks. We will also assist in future genomic studies that result from this phenotype collection.Objective 2.3: Estimating variability in lamb growth performance and carcass quality due to genetic and non-genetic factors. We will assist in the 'deep phenotyping' of lambs from each lamb crop among the Rambouillet and crossbred lambs from MSU. We will also assist in future genomic studies that result from this phenotype collection.Objective 3.1: Estimation of genetic and non-genetic parameters of and between ewe productivity, gastrointestinal nematode susceptibility, and longevity.Production data will be collected on the sheep within the MSU flock which are enrolled on NSIP, as well as the commercial flock. Longevity traits such as udder health, foot conformation, and moutch scores will be collected to contribute to the large database to allow for the development of longevity related indexes for genetic selection in the US sheep industry. We will also assist in future genomic studies that result from this phenotype collection.Objective 3.4: Increase year-round sheep milk production. We will estimate the genetic proportion of dairy sheep breeding through the use of DNA marker panels such as the Ovine 50K SNP chip. Genotypic data will be used in conjunction with publically available data to estimate the proportion of dairy (East Friesian and Lacuane) breeding through the use of ADMIXTURE software. This proportion will then be supplied to the other objective collaborators for estimating the effect of proportion of dairy breeding on milk lactation and reproductive parameters.