Genetic benchmarking of Maternal sheep flocks using genomic testing

This study aimed to examine the predictive ability of the "Flock Profile" genomic benchmarking method in maternal sheep flocks, estimated from the Maternal LAMBPLAN analysis. Data from this analysis was used in a validation study to test the accuracy of predicting mean flock performance for reproductive traits. For each validation flock, the pedigree, genotypes and performance data were removed for the entire flock and then its Flock Profile result was estimated from genomic predictions based on estimated SNP marker effects from single step genomic BLUP analyses (ssGBLUP). The Flock Profile results were then compared to the original Australian Sheep Breeding Values (ASBVs) from the full analysis. The accuracy of ranking of mean flock performance was high (r>0.85) for all traits except ewe rearing ability. However, the Flock Profile results were generally over-dispersed and thus had more variation compared to their ASBVs. Genomic predictions for individual animals were also highly correlated to the full ASBVs. This initial study supports further investment into the development of these products, with the potential to offer commercial producers new genetic tools to foster ongoing improvement in on-farm profitability.