Combined LambPlan: Expanding the mulit-breed nature of the LambPlan evaluation

The Australian sheep industry continues to mix breeds across all sectors, including ram breeding. Genetic evaluation needs to change with industry and provide relevant comparisons across breeds. This has prompted a development to combine the LAMBPLAN Terminal and Maternal evaluations. Combining analyses will provide a single breeding value ‘language’ across non-Merino breeds and continue to allow breeders to access selection tools to meet their breeding objectives irrespective of breed. This study summarises the key technical enhancements to deliver the Combined LAMBPLAN analysis, including: business decisions around data usage, formation of lifetime contemporary groups, genetic group structure and the use of a meta-founder model, fixed effects models, heterosis adjustments and parameter re-estimation. The combined evaluation will provide an improved utility of ASBVs for the Australian prime lamb industry.