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Empirical Selection Indexes for Beef Cattle^{1, 2,}

North Carolina State University, Raleigh 27607

Abstract

CONSTRUCTION of conventional selection indexes requires a knowledge of the genetic parameters of the population. With consideration of the relative economic importance and the genetic parameters, breeding plans can be developed.

A prerequisite to the success of these breeding plans is the accurate estimation of the genetic parameters. Each estimate has its sampling error and the more traits used in a conventional selection index the more errors are involved. It is, therefore, very important that the genetic parameters, used for constructing the indexes, be reliable estimates derived from suitable data. This information is not always readily available, especially to the commercial cow-calf operator. Indexes calculated by a simple method that does not require estimates of genetic parameters would be useful. Also, a commercial producer must frequently select young females without any direct information on their performance in the particular trait and must use information on the females' performance in other traits or on performance of ancestors.

¹ Paper No. 3467 of the Journal Series of the North Carolina State University Agricultural Experiment Station, Raleigh.

² Computing services for this investigation were supported by Public Health Service Grant FR-00011.

³ Present address: Research Station, Lethbridge, Alberta.