Selection to improve birth and weaning weight of Javanese Fat Tailed Sheep

Abstract

In Indonesia, the javanese Fat Tailed Sheep is very popular domestic animal for its meat production. However, selection to increase body weight has never been done by local farmers. As a result the variability of body weight is high, and expected that application of a selection program can improve this trait. Two step of selection were done in order to improve birth and body weight. In the first selection, the elite group was established by selecting the best 40 females and 3 males from 12500 sheep reared by local farmers based on their mature body weight and tail length.