Morphological body measurements, body indices, and their genetic background for several Chinese goat breeds

This field work was conducted to describe the body measurements and the body indices along with the correlations among them for 513 goats organized into the following breeds: Saanen milk goat (B₁), Black Boer x Dazu black goat (B₂), Hechuan white goat (B₃), Dazu black goat (B₄), Inner Mongolia cashmere goat (B₅), B₄ x B₅ cross (B₆), and B₆x B₆ cross (B₇) residents of different Chinese regions but raised in Dazu Black farm, Beibei, Southwest China. Data were collected on adult males and females of similar age (36.50 ± 0.75 months). Results showed that the B₄, B₂, B₆, and B₇ were heavier than other breeds with mean live body weight of 60.80, 59.00, 62.75, and 63.08 kg, respectively, while that of B₃, B₁, and B₅ were 57.00, 43.42, and 57.15 kg. Meanwhile, B₁, B₂, B₅, B₆, and B₇ had longer bodies than other breeds, recording 77.00, 73.83, 72.50, 65.17, and 67.17 cm, respectively. As for wither height, B₁, B₂, B₄, B₅, and B₆ recorded 75.33, 68.33, 68.33, 66.67, and 66.17 cm, respectively. These differences were significant (P < 0.05). The results revealed variable correlation coefficients among body measurements. Most body indices showed variation in estimated correlations between breed groups (P < 0.05). These findings revealed the presence of a wide range of differences for body measurements and the body indices among studied breeds. Such diversity in the body conformation is crucial to implement reliable selection strategies for breeding goats, Also, these findings can help to commence future step for appraisal of quantitative traits and initiate genome analysis.