Assessing Reproductive Performance to Establish Benchmarks for Small-Holder Beef Cattle Herds in South Africa.

ABSTRACT: Smallholder beef cattle farms in South Africa have had low reproductive performance, which has been associated with management practices. Considering current farm management practices, a multi-stage selection study was conducted to assess reproductive performance as defined by pregnancy rate, fetal and calf losses, calving interval and days open to benchmark reproductive performance. Data were collected twice, in autumn (March-May) for pregnancy diagnosis and in spring (September-November) for monitoring of confirmed pregnancies. Overall, 3694 cow records from 40 smallholder herds were collected during 2018 and 2019 breeding seasons from five provinces. The preferred 25th quartile described target performance and GLIMMIX procedure determined associations between management practices and pe

SUBMITTER: Nkadimeng M 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC9657001 | biostudies-literature | 2022 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature