|
...Breeders have relied primarily on imported
stock to improve their herds. Some have studied Mendel,
classic livestock breeding theory, and their histograms. Others have relied on advertising, hype and show winnings to guide their decisions. All this is about to change; alpaca breeders now have at their command a new engine of improvement, a surefire,science based model. This new engine is Expected Progeny Differences (EPDs)
EPD’s: The Path to Alpaca Excellence
At first blush, animal breeding seems relatively simple. If you believe ‘like
begets like’ all you need to do is mate similar animals. If you want a further
edge up - study pedigree. If that is not good enough, you can measure phenotype making sure only the best are included in your breeding plan. The problem is none of these strategies is particularly effective, and many of the beliefs that breeders rely on are black magic. Myth makes the animal improvement equation more complex than it need be. Before we can get on to steady measurable improvement, we must sweep a few myths out of the closet. One of the more pervasive myths in the alpaca industry
is, ‘The best way to select elite breeding stock is by analyzing their phenotype.’ It is closely followed in importance, by the myth that ‘pedigree equals breeding value.’ I think is it is fair to say that breeders’ faith in pedigree often takes on mythic proportions, but their faith is not born from the science of genetics. But, before I get to that we need to critically analyze the role that phenotype and pedigree play in breed improvement programs.
Phenotype is at least 50% environment, nurture and husbandry. Add that to Mendel’s laws of inheritance, which states that dominant genes express themselves and recessive genes hide from view, and you begin to understand why phenotype is a poor guide to breeding value. If we
are to breed for elite alpacas, we must have a dependable method of determining which animals will pass on superior traits in predictable fashion. Simply analyzing an alpaca’s phenotype as a guide to the animals breeding value is an entirely ineffective improvement strategy. It is a fact that assessing an alpaca’s phenotype to determine its breeding value is the least reliable method of selection. Pedigrees document ancestors beautifully but are only of marginal assistance when being used to identify alpacas that will breed true. The great-grandsire of any given alpaca contributes 1/8th of his genes to the total genetic makeup the grandson. Selection based on pedigree as the sole selection criteria, assuming a 30% heritability factor, is from 38 to 55% accurate (Understanding Animal Breeding, 2000, Richard Bourdan). This means if you use the pedigree to make breeding decisions, you will be right about 50% of the time. When you add the measurement of individual phenotypic traits—records for fleece density, micron count, staple length and so on-- to your analysis the accuracy of selection increases to about 65%. However, if you add the production records of the parent’s progeny to the analysis your ability to predict improvement increases to near 100%. There is simply too much that a pedigree does not tell you about an alpaca. The critical flaw in using pedigree to select and breed alpacas is that the information most useful to the breeder, from a genetic improvement perspective, is not on the pedigree. ARI pedigrees
1) do not record an alpaca’s phenotypic performance statistics;
2) do not identify siblings or progeny; and
3) do not identify prepotency or breeding value. Relying on a pedigree as an effective way to select superior breeding stock is based more on myth than fact. Craig Wheaton-Smith made the following observation about the use of pedigree in his book Breeding Better Cows (1957).
“Making Use of Pedigree: As things stand the vast majority of our dairy
stock are sired by unproven bulls, and quite a few are by bulls proved
to be bad (if the proof were fully available) the deficiency of merit being
well compensated for by sales technique and management.”
“Bulls, then, sold on their pedigrees and widely used before their
merits are known, place considerable obstacles in the way of breeding
from only the better half of the population.”
Wheaton-Smith is not the only one to point out the problems associated with
using pedigree as a selection tool. The renowned geneticist Dr. A. L. Hagedoorn had this to say about the value of pedigree in the fourth edition of his famous text, Animal Breeding:
“The faith in a beautiful pedigree is often astonishing. I remember how
the Dutch agricultural press wrote about the ‘breeding value’ of a bull
sold to a Japanese delegation, in terms that made one think this must
have been a bull proven by long lists of exceptionally good daughters.
It was said to be a pity that such bulls were sold to foreigners. When
the article went on to state that the bull was ten months old, one
wondered about the faith Orientals still seem to have in ancestry.”
Pedigrees can be helpful in locating relatives of families known to have high breeding values for certain traits, and the higher the heritability factor for the
trait being selected for; the more one can rely on the ancestor’s presence in the pedigree. But, the truth of the matter is that the only accurate way to determine the breeding value or dominance of a particular parent is to research their progeny.
PERFORMANCE RECORDS
Before we proceed to a discussion of progeny testing, a word about performance records. The primary reason that an animal breeder keeps performance records is to track the breeding value of a given dam or sire. In the alpaca business, these records are most often used to promote a specific animal’s quality. You may have noticed the extensive use of a herdsire’s
histogram to hype the claim that he is potent and wonderful, simply based on his micron count. An astute observer might also notice that in successive ads,
published over a period of time, the micron count never changes. This is physiologically impossible and, aside from being a misuse of the performance record, it should serve to make the point that one can’t always believe the claims of a herdsire’s potency offered by an owner. The idea of a “proven” stud is often misunderstood. Many people take the term to mean that the stud has simply sired a number of defect-free offspring. When a geneticist or a knowledgeable animal breeder uses the term, they mean that the sire has “proven” that he can consistently pass his positive production traits onto his progeny. In other words, he has a high breeding value.
PROGENY TESTING
To make accurate selection decisions about your herd, you must be able to
assess the breeding value of a given alpaca – whether or not it will pass its
genotype and phenotypic superiority on to its offspring. To assess a sire’s
breeding value, you must know how many cria it has and how consistently
they express the parent’s phenotype. In other words, you must progeny test.
A geneticist tells the animal breeder that they must assess the progeny of a
given ancestor before deciding if the ancestor is the appropriate sire or dam for Pedigrees can be helpful in locating relatives of families known to have high breeding values for certain traits... But...the only accurate way to determine the breeding value or dominance of a particular parent is to research their progeny. A progeny test, involves multiple matings of an individual animal with a measured evaluation of its offspring that helps
predict that individual’s breeding value. Progeny testing for alpacas involves using a phenotypic evaluation form to evaluate the phenotype of a stud’s offspring for such important traits as, fleece weight and fineness. Other heritable traits such as size and bite can also be scored. The records that are
gathered on phenotype evaluation forms or from the breeder’s production, records become the basis for establishing Expected Progeny Differences (EPDs). EPDs allow the comparison of breeding values between multiple herdsires.
PROGENY TESTING AND HERD IMPROVEMENT
The most important decision any breeder makes is when they select the
male that will breed their females. The next most important decision is when
they select a replacement male. Once progeny testing is used to evaluate
several males, breeders can select the superior animal as a stud and avoid
using the males with low breeding values. The males chosen by progeny tests
will have higher breeding values. In this manner, the herd’s quality will quickly
compound.
Breeders who incorporate the information gleaned from progeny testing into
their mating decisions will experience a steep improvement curve within
their herd. The myth that ‘pedigree equals breeding value,’ or that, ‘the best
way to select breeding stock is by analyzing their phenotype’ will cease to be
a roadblock to improvement. The increased quality, herd wide, will quickly
compound and be reflected in fleece weights, fiber fineness and other
quantifiable economic and conformation traits. The additional gain made
over three to four generations will be dramatic.
There are several factors which inhibit the ability of breeders’ successful
deployment of the factors described above. They include small average herd
size, a poor central record-keeping facility, lack of shared records, and lack
of access to progeny tested males. To assess a sire’s breeding value, you must know how many cria it has and how consistently they express the parent’s phenotype. In other words, you must progeny test.
PREREQUISITES FOR IMPROVEMENT
There are four general industry prerequisites for rapid, breed-wide alpaca
improvement.
1. Breeding objectives: There needs to be goal of excellence, which
focuses primarily on heritable, commercial traits;
2. Performance evaluation: There needs to be a central record keeping
system established that measures and records performance for
specific commercial fleece characteristics. These records form the
basis for establishing heritability estimates for specific characteristics
and expected progeny differences (EPDs) for specific animals.
3. Breeding systems: There needs to be mating systems established
that maximize the rate of genetic gain in a predetermined direction.
4. Pedigree records: Clear, accurate records of ancestors should be
recorded and available.
DRAMATIC GENETIC IMPROVEMENT
There are also four basic genetic prerequisites for rapid breed improvement:
1. genetic variability
2. selection intensity
3. selection accuracy
4. generational interval
Genetic variation is extremely important to the rate of gain. The more variation
for a particular trait in a population, the more potential there is for change. If
breeders have a wide variety of animals to choose from–such as those with high or low fleece weights–they can select alpacas with high fleece weight and breed for the trait. Improvement in fleece weight will be rapid.
Selection accuracy is important if any improvement or gain is to be made. This
means the traits you select for must be heritable. Accuracy assumes that we have the ability to separate superior and inferior animals. If you select for a heritable characteristic, such as fleece weight, you must identify superior stud males who historically have produced offspring with higher than average fleece weights to insure the trait is passed to the offspring. The same goes for fineness, crimp, staple length, etc. The single most effective way to do this is by establishing EPD’s.
Selection intensity means being highly selective of progeny produced by the
parents you have chosen for foundation stock, and retaining in your herd only
the offspring that exhibit a superior expression of the trait under selection. This ensures that breeding values will remain high and that each generation of offspring should improve: The higher the selection intensity, the higher the rate of genetic gain.
Generational interval affects the rate of genetic change simply because the more rapidly one generation replaces the previous one, the faster the potential gain. Mice reproduce more quickly than humans, producing 150 generations in the time it takes humans to produce one. (This makes it much easier to effect change in mice than in humans. And improving people is a
problem because there is very little culling undertaken.) Generational interval is determined by the average age of the producing males and females in a given herd. Alpacas have a generation interval of four to six years for females and approximately five years for males, although this interval will vary from herd to herd. The shorter the interval the faster the gain. To construct an improvement model that allows each of these principles to work efficiently with our current industry organization, there needs to be a large group of alpacas sharing performance records and genetics. Many small breeders
with smaller herds will, when acting together, out perform even the largest
breeder.
The “how” is EPD’s.
WHAT ARE EXPECTED PROGENY DIFFERENCES?
An EPD is an estimate of the genetic merit of an animal for a single trait. The EPD is the expected difference between the performance of a specific animal’s progeny for a specific trait and the average performance of all progeny for that trait.
CREATING AN EPD DATABASE
Alpaca breeders will need to record performance values for their animals. This
information can be posted via a web-based tool. Most of the necessary information would be compiled from a histogram, (Information graph) and then
downloaded to the database. The data from alpacas reared under many different management systems is combined into one file. Many small breeders with smaller herds will, when acting together, out perform even the largest breeder.
A computer software program (BLUP: Best Liner Unbiased Prediction) then identifies the genetic linkages between the alpacas. The dataset for the alpacas includes all the data from previous years, for all the relatives, across generations. The EPD calculations include data from related traits, because an animal’s performance in any trait gives information on how it will perform in a similar trait (for example, fleece weight and staple length). These calculations produce EPD values on every trait for every alpaca herdsire, dam and cria in the system. And these EPDs are recalculated, annually, after the performance records from each new production cycle is entered into the database.
EPDs are not constants; they are estimates of genetic merit that change
over time as new information accumulates on an animal and its relatives. Thus
each year results in a new set of EPDs for all animals, with progressive increases in the accuracy of the estimates and in the breeders ability to discriminate among prospective breeding animals.
HOW ARE EPDs REPORTED?
An EPD is reported in the normal units for the trait, such as +0.75 pounds (for
fleece weights) or -0.4 microns (for fiber diameter). It’s important to note that an EPD value is not a ratio or an index. EPDs are expressed as deviations (+ or -) from the average population value, which is considered to be zero. This average of the herd’s performance, which is used to establish the baseline (zero) for comparison purposes, might be recalculated periodically, probably every five years. EPDs always have a positive (+) or negative (-) sign in front of them. The positive and negative symbols don’t always mean better or worse--it depends on the particular trait. For example, a fleece weight of +0.75 pounds is good (more fleece than the average of the herd under evaluation) but a Fiber Diameter EPD of -0.3 microns is also good, i.e. finer fiber than the average. These EPDs are used to compare herdsires, for instance, a stud with a fleece weight EPD of +3.0 is good, but a different stud with a fleece weight EPD of +4.0 is better. EPDs may take a little getting used to, but once you get the hang of them, they give the most objective and reliable estimation of genetic value possible. The calculation of EPDs uses data from many different herds, and this procedure is mathematically valid across herds, so long as none of the herds is genetically isolated from the others. But the feed regimen at all farms must be good enough to permit good performance. An EPD is an estimate of the genetic merit of an
animal for a single trait.
ACROSS-HERD GENETIC EVALUATION
For cooperating breeders, the purpose of large-scale genetic evaluation is not
complicated: They simply want to compare the performance of their animals
to one another and those in different herds. Why is this important? Suppose an alpaca breeder has what he or she believes is the best stud male in the world. Without a method of comparing this male’s performance to that of other males in other herds, the owner can never know the truth of their belief. Across-herd or large-scale genetic evaluation allows the truth of excellence to be proven and then shared. Almost as important as the EPDs of excellent sires is the identification of underperforming animals. The value of culling inferior genotypes cannot be overestimated. Across-herd evaluation provides an honest way to assess an animal’s potential, and this creates the opportunity for rapid genetic gain. The process of evaluating individual alpacas through direct comparison with alpacas in different herds enables cooperating breeders to more accurately select from a more genetically
diverse, yet increasingly improved, gene pool.
THE VALUE OF EPDS
Richard Bourdon makes the value of large-scale evaluation clear. “Just as it is
easier to field quality athletic teams at a big school than at a small school because the big school has more athletes to choose from,” Bourdon writes, “so it is easier to find truly outstanding breeding animals in a large population than in a small one.” When a group of cooperating breeders shares records by using a central database, they create, for themselves, an enormous advantage. They control, for their collective benefit, many times the information of a single breeder. In the animal breeding business, this information is the key to success. When acrossherd data is gathered, the accuracy of prediction increases by the sheer volume of the information available. The EPDs for the various sires and bloodlines can be readily and accurately established. People often ask me how long I believe the alpaca market will last. In view of the fact that alpacas are one of the world’s oldest domesticated livestock I think it is fair to say that there will be a market in alpacas long after you and I are gone. I also believe that so long as breeders see improvement and potential in the breed they will remain passionate about alpacas. I have been raising alpacas for almost twenty-five years and I am more excited about them today than ever before. Shortly before he died, I asked Don Julio Barreda if he had any regrets about spending his entire life raising alpacas, “No, he said, I only wish I had another 50 years to spend with my herd.” I hope, at the end of the day, we all look back and feel the same.
THE ABC’s of EPD’s
A. Alpaca Fiber Market
...By using EPDs to select breeding stock, U.S. breeders can steadily increase the cash value of their fleece by creating finer and heavier fleeces...
B. Bloodlines & Branding
...Alpaca breeders who study and understand the power of selection by EPDs will create bloodlines to rival and surpass Accoyo. New standards of excellence will be created and markets for high breeding value alpacas
and their fleece will expand...
C. Competitive Advantage
...An alpaca’s EPDs will become far more important than its show winnings or where it came from. Science will replace hype. Breeders whose herds have high EPDs will become brand name bloodlines...
The ABC’s of EPD’s
A new chapter is about to be written in the history of alpaca breed improvement. It will identify the exact point in time that the industry changed for the better, invigorating the market for both alpaca fleece and breeding stock. New bloodlines will be discovered, additional breeds developed, and new breeders will step forward to lead. Alpacas were fashioned from the wild Vicuna 6,000 years ago. For 5,975 years, the Quechua Indians of South America nurtured the breed, wove cloth, bartered textiles and eventually sold the fleece creating a cash income. During this time, the quality of the breed remained fairly static. There were exceptions, men like Julio Barreda made dramatic improvement within their herds, but the average quality of the 3,500,000 alpacas in the world have changed very little. Twenty five years ago, alpacas began making their way to new homes around the world. Today alpacas are found in more than twenty countries. Their new owners are intent on improving the breed. Heretofore alpaca improvement had been dependent on the eye and intuition of the shepherd. Outside of Peru, breeders have relied primarily on imported stock to improve their herds. Some
have studied Mendel, classic livestock breeding theory,and their histograms. Others have relied on advertising,hype and show winnings to guide their decisions. All this is about to change; alpaca breeders now have at their command a new engine of improvement, a sure fire, science based model, this new engine is Expected Progeny Differences (EPDs). I first heard about
EPDs many years ago during a lecture by Dr. Dorian Garrick at Greg Mecklem’s Parade of Champions sale. I read about them in Richard Bourdon’s book, Understanding Animal Breeding. I attended an EPD conference in New Zealand led by Dr. Alan Casey and lectures by Dr. David Notter of Virginia Tech University. All advocated the use of Best Linear Unbiased Prediction (BLUP) software to create EPDs to guide alpaca selection decisions. EPDs combine pedigree and production records to make estimates of breeding values. I created the Ideal Alpaca Community (IAC), beginning in 2004, to capitalize on the science of EPDs and make the technology available through a personal computer at every alpaca ranch. I believe that once alpaca breeders understand the ABC’s of EPDs they will embrace the opportunity
to improve the value of their stock. Small breeders will compete on a level playing field with large breeders. New markets will be created. Alpaca breeders who have identified an ideal standard for the breed can use EPDs
to create alpacas that meet and eventually exceed their expectation.10
Alpaca breeders who have identified an ideal standard for the breed can use
EPDs to create alpacas that meet and eventually exceed their expectation. High fleece weights and low micron counts will be systematically achieved. Progress will be quantified scientifically. Breeders will no longer rely on the show ring to validate their success. EPDs will expand the commercial opportunities and create a new future for alpacas world wide. Is this optimism justifiable? Let’s look at the ABC’s of EPDs.
THE ABC’S
A. Alpaca Fiber Market
Alpaca Owners in the United States need to realize that their cost structure will not support the profitable sale of commercial quality fleece at the current price. The price of poor quality fleece will never pay for the high cost of maintaining alpaca breeding stock in the U.S, even as the herd grows to commercial size. This does not mean that American breeders should feel pessimistic about the value of their alpacas as fiber producers, nor should they abandon their pursuit of profitable fleece sales. By using EPDs to select breeding stock, U.S. breeders can steadily increase the cash value of their fleece by creating finer and heavier fleeces. Highly heritable traits are those that are strongly tied to genotype. By carefully selecting and breeding for the genes that control valuable commercial traits, you ensure these traits in the herd’s offspring. Production traits, such as fleece weight and fineness, tend to be moderately to highly heritable. EPDs allow breeders to accurately select parents that have a high probability of passing on these desirable traits.
The table on page 12 is a list of the heritability values for production traits in
sheep. I developed this table after tabulating the results of ten doctoral theses on fleece heritability in sheep. Heritability estimates for most traits are fairly consistent across breeds and species. What is highly heritable in one is often highly heritable in another. Fleece heritability is fairly consistent between sheep, mohair goats, and cashmere goats. In 2008, with the publishing of the initial IAC EPDs, the alpaca industry will also have, for the first time, have preliminary heritability estimates for alpacas. By using EPDs to
select breeding stock, U.S. breeders can steadily increase the cash value of
their fleece by creating finerand heavier fleeces.
Alpaca breeders who have identified an ideal standard for the breed can use
EPDs to create alpacas that meet and eventually exceed their expectation. High fleece weights and low micron counts will be systematically achieved. Progress will be quantified scientifically. Breeders will no longer rely on the show ring to validate their success. EPDs will expand the commercial opportunities and create a new future for alpacas world wide. Is this optimism justifiable?
Let’s look at the ABC’s of EPDs.
TABLE 1: TYPICAL FLEECE HERITABILITY IN SHEEP
Source: Mike Safley, gathered from data at Oregon State University Library (2000)
As a rule, heritability values of twenty percent or less are considered marginally or lowly heritable and are not consistently passed on to offspring. Traits with heritability values between twenty percent and forty percent are considered moderately heritable and can be reliably transmitted from parent to offspring. Traits with heritability values above forty percent are considered highly heritable; they will be passed on to the offspring with a high degree of certainty. If a particular trait is highly heritable, all the relatives of an animal will tend to inherit the set of genes that determine the trait. In other words, they will look the alike. It is easiest to understand heritability, and how it influences selection response, by understanding the following example regarding fleece fineness. Suppose that, in your herd, females produced an average of thirtymicron fleece and the stud males produced an average of twenty-two micron fleece. The selection differential achieved across both sexes is eight microns (30-22=8). If the heritability of fleece fineness (at two years of age)is fifty percent, then fifty percent of the eight microns of the stud’s superiority will be passed on to offspring. This means that you could expect, on average, four microns of improvement in the two-year fleece fineness of the next generation (50% x 8 microns = 4). It is important to note that this scenario achieves an increase in the average performance of the next generation—it does not subtract four microns from the fleece fineness of every cria. As you can see in the table below, alpaca is the world’s rarest specialty fiber. Unlike wool, there is never a large, unsold inventory hanging over the market. The only restriction on the alpaca fiber market is supply: there is simply too little fine fiber. ...alpaca is the world’s rarest specialty fiber...The only restriction on the alpaca fiber market is supply: there is simply too little fine fiber.
TABLE 2: FINE FIBER PRODUCTION (IN TONS)
Source: Australian National Conference 2002. “The Finer Future: Insight into the Australian
Fibre Market,” John Blood
At today’s prices, (See table 3, below), twenty-six-micron alpaca fiber sells for $17 per kg which is $7 more than nineteen-micron sheep’s wool ($10/kg), but
it sells for much less than seventeen-micron cashmere at $116 per kg. Fineness determines seventy to eighty percent of any fleece’s value. Vicuna sells for $500 per kg at 13.5 microns and this is before the cost of de-hairing. Baby alpaca at 21.5 micron sells for $21 per/kg and Royal baby alpaca at 19.5
microns sells for $42 per kg.
TABLE 3: MARKET PRICES FOR NATURAL FIBERS
Cashmere is an inferior product to alpaca; it has shorter staple length (1.25 inches verses 3 to 4 inches) and has excessive guard hair which must be removed at considerable cost. We need to ask ourselves what the price premium would be for the long stapled huacaya fiber if it were as fine as cashmere, or if suri fiber were considerably finer than mohair. If breeders use scientific selection systems and Best Linear Unbiased Prediction (BLUP) software to establish EPDs, they can vastly improve alpacas in as few as 4 generations. The average micron count of cashmere is four to five microns coarser than that of vicuñas, the alpacas’ ancestor. With vicuna genes in their DNA it is reasonable to assume that we can dramatically reduce the micron count of the alpaca’s fleece. Alpaca breeders who focus on fineness, who relentlessly select alpacas with low micron counts, and who know that the trait is likely to be fifty-percent heritable, might accomplish the following results in four to five generations.
In the fourth generation, a herd averaging eighteen micron fleeces weighing 15 pounds could become profitable. As breeding stock, they would command
high prices. The fleece would be worth many times the price of today’s clip, and begin to provide an owner with a viable cash flow. At 16 microns, alpaca
fleeces could sell for $123 per pound, with each alpaca producing 15 pounds of fleece and $1,845 of revenue. By the fifth generation, there could be
alpaca herds raised solely for their fiber production. Alpacas, the descendants of vicuñas, surely carry the diminutive camelids’ fineness genes. To create the
fiber of the future, we need to fish the fineness out of our domestic stock, reinvent alpacas, and create a 24/7 fineness fiber factory. I recently received the following histogram (figure 1) from a breeder in Australia. At 12.8 microns their alpaca has Vicuna fine fiber.
At current production levels, it takes approximately thirty-three alpacas to produce a hundred kilos per year, or approximately 6.4 pounds (2.9 kilos) per alpaca, amounting to $51.20 per alpaca at the 2008 world price of $8 per pound. If alpaca fiber were fine enough to attract a price comparable to cashmere, or $53.00 per pound, and produced 15 pounds per alpaca, the return would be $795 per alpaca. A herd of one hundred alpacas, producing cashmere-quality fleece, could earn $79,500 per year in fleece sales. Vicuña fiber sells for $227 a pound—the same one hundred alpacas producing vicuña-quality fleece would produce $3,405 worth of fleece per animal, or $340,500 annually. The challenge will be to increase both fleece weight and fineness at the same time. EPD improved alpacas will demand extremely high prices as breeding stock and enjoy intense worldwide demand. This is a future worth working for: high dollar bloodlines and a generous cash crop—annually.
B. Bloodlines and Branding
Estancia Accoyo is located at least 36 hours from almost every alpaca breeder outside of Peru. Highly motivated breeders interested in visiting Accoyo must
first fly into Lima and then on to Juliaca and finally drive many hours to Macusani. Once they arrive in Macusani they must venture out of town and take unmarked paths through pastures that are bisected by two streams. If it rained hard that morning they may have to wait a day. There are no bridges. Yet every alpaca breeder in the world has heard of Estancia Accoyo, Don Julio Barreda and the tiny town of Macusani which sits astride a river not far from the Amazon Jungle. Turn the pages of any Alpaca Magazine from England, New Zealand, Australia or the United States and “Accoyo” will be the dominant bloodline featured. The truth is that Accoyo is the alpaca world’s only recognized bloodline. The word translates into cash sales; it has “high” name recognition. Accoyo is a brand as well as a bloodline. Every breed has highly recognizable bloodlines. There are 40,000 race horses born in the United States every year. Each year no more than 20 horses make it to the Kentucky Derby. In 2008 every horse in the field was an ancestor of Native Dancer, 13 horses made it to the Preakness, the second leg of the Triple Crown and all had Native Dancer in their pedigree, 9 entered the Belmont, the third leg of the Triple Crown, and 9 were related to Native Dancer; some as many as 4 times. Pedigree breeding is about bloodlines. EPDs identify the prepotent sires and the best bloodlines. EPD improved alpacas will demand extremely high prices as breeding stock and enjoy intense worldwide demand.
There are approximately 900 breeds of cattle, hundreds of dog breeds and sheep breeds galore. There are only two alpaca breeds, three if you include Don Julio Barreda’s famous A and B line of huacaya. Don Julio told me, many times, that “alpacas could be developed into dozens of breeds”. With EPDs at our command, new breeds and bloodlines of alpacas are in our immediate future. Alpaca breeders who take the time to study and understand the power of selection by EPDs will create bloodlines to rival and even surpass Accoyo. Don Julio would welcome the challenge, he always said “a man moves a little faster if he knows someone is behind him.” New standards of excellence will be created and markets for high breeding value alpacas and their fleece will expand. Just as the alpaca breeders of the world journey to Accoyo, they will beat a path to your door if you have the world’s best alpaca.
C. Competitive Advantage
In today’s market, large breeders have a distinct advantage over small breeders in the sale of stud quality males. The large breeder uses show winnings and histograms and lots of advertising dollars to promote their stud sales. Small breeders can’t compete. The same is true for females. That will change when EPDs become the measure of breeding value. Breeders searching for their next herdsire will no longer have to guess about the breeding value of their purchase. An alpaca’s EPDs will become far more important than its show winnings or where it came from. Science will replace hype. The small breeder’s male or female can become every bit as valuable as the big breeders. In the future EPDs will become an important part of alpaca marketing. Auction sales will announce the EPDs for sale animals. The buyers will pour over the herd improvement reports provided by Dr. Notter’s staff at Virginia Tech University. Alpacas whose trait rankings are in the upper percentiles will sell for more money. Breeders whose herds have high EPDs will become brand name bloodlines.
THE IDEAL ALPACA COMMUNITY (IAC)
The Ideal Alpaca Community was created to facilitate a National Alpaca Improvement Program. The IAC website serves as a web-based collection point for the information necessary to create EPDs. The website interfaces with Yocom McColl Testing Laboratory and Virginia Tech University. IAC members use their personal computers to record the pedigree and production data that is submitted to Dr. Notter’s staff at Virginia Tech. ...breeders who...study and understand the power ofselection by EPDs will create bloodlines to rivaland even surpass Accoyo.
Once the EPDs are calculated, they are reported to each individual IAC member by Virginia Tech. The members herd data is theirs alone. The reference sires or Studmaster™ male’s trait rankings will be published on the website. A report created by Dr. Notter will graph the individual EPDs relationship to the other alpacas in the breed and the mean for the trait. Each breeder will know where their individual alpaca ranks in relationship to all the alpacas in the IAC herd. Each member can choose whether to publish their results or not. In the future, breeders will seek out breeding males with the highest EPDs for the traits they wish to include in their herd. Breeding decisions based on EPDs yield dramatically higher improvement curves than traditional selection methods and the progress is scientifically verified. Each year a new genetics report is published. The chart below is taken from the IAC website. It is an interactive tool that guides you through the entire EPD process and articulates every detail of the program.
IAC membership is open to all owners of ARI registered alpacas. The program was developed based on a nucleus breeding scheme known as a reference sire improvement model that is used in many livestock industries. The IAC uses reference sires known as Studmaster™ males to disseminate reference genetics into member herds which allow all the alpacas in a given herd to be assigned EPDs.
NUCLEUS BREEDING SCHEMES
Richard Bourdon defines nucleus schemes as, “a cooperative breeding program in which elite animals are concentrated in a nucleus herd or flock and superior germ plasm is then distributed among cooperative herds or flocks to the nucleus.” There are two types of nucleus breeding schemes: closed and open. The closed system is similar to the breeding program at Accoyo. No new blood is introduced into the nucleus herd. All replacement stock is bred from the existing herd. A quality-based hierarchy is imposed. There are pre-potent sires and elite dams. All replacement studs must be the product of the special sires and the elite dams. New sires should be progeny tested before being used in the general population, although this is not always the case. Genetics from a closed nucleus system flow in one direction: from the nucleus herd out. This is a system employed by the parent studs of the Australian merino industry. Parent studs are the source of elite genetics which they sell to “daughter studs” which reproduce or multiply the genetics and distribute them to the commercial herds. In essence, the daughter studs are customers of the parent studs, dependent on them for a steady supply of improved genetics. In an open nucleus-breeding scheme, the genetics flow in both directions. (See Figure 3) Females and males from cooperating herds become part of the nucleus. The dynamics of the improvement that takes place are easy to grasp. Assume that the herd sires of an open nucleus alpaca improvement program were all well chosen, progeny-tested sires. The first generation of alpaca cria born to the nucleus will all be made up of at least half of these superior genes. (Fifty percent of their genetic material will come from the superior sires.) The next generation of cria will contain at least 75% of the elite germ plasm. These results flow naturally from the use of progeny-tested males. This consolidation of superior genetics can take place without inbreeding.
In an open nucleus-breeding program... consolidation of superior genetics can take place without inbreeding
In spite of the initial successes of these nucleus schemes there are problems creating and maintaining them, which are both practical and political. This
type of program requires a common location where the nucleus can be operated as a herd in an environmentally neutral fashion. This creates considerable expense to the participating breeders. They also need to contribute their best breeding stock to the new location. This creates a problem for all but the largest operations. It would certainly be a problem in the alpaca industry which is characterized by smaller herds.
REFERENCE SIRES
An alternative improvement model is a reference sire improvement program. This requires the assembly of a number of cooperating herds that use jointly
owned males in their individual herds. The process of sharing males allows the owners to collectively progeny test the herd sires. The system also allows
for the testing necessary to eliminate the environment from the EPD herd sires. The group then shares the information in a common database and a sire
reference summary can be constructed. EPDs are established and each sire’s performance can be compared to the other reference sires and the additional sires being used in the general population. This is the IAC model and the reason for joint ownership of herdsires in the Studmaster™ male program. I chose the initial herd sires in the program and sold shares to buyers who owned diverse herds. This created the predicate for the EPD program.
In the future StudMaster™ males will be identified based on their EPDs regardless of who owns them. The purpose of a reference sire breed improvement program is the calculation of Expected Progeny Differences (EPDs) for the herds of alpacas owned by the cooperating breeders and the herds of those who purchase offspring related to the reference sires. These EPDs quantify the breeding value of each alpaca in the flock. Reference sires leave offspring in each of the cooperating flocks. The offspring of the reference sires can then be compared with the offspring of any other sires used in the same flock. Thus, the best males in the whole of the group breeding scheme can be identified by the help of geneticists at Virginia Tech University.
HOW TO PARTICIPATE IN THE IAC
There are three ways to obtain the reference genetics and participate in the IAC EPD program. For instance, Hemingway is an IAC reference herdsire and has 407 offspring and many, many grand children. If you own one of his descendants, you qualify for membership in the IAC. There are currently 35 reference sires known as Studmaster™ males. If you own a descendant of any one of these, you qualify. Most breeders will find they are already qualified to join.
There is no charge to belong and use the service. There are three ways to qualify
for IAC membership:
1. Own the progeny of a reference sire.
2. Own a pregnant female bred to a reference sire.
3. Own a reference sire.
Additional reference sires are being added to the Studmaster™ list. For instance,the IAC recently nominated the famous sire Accoyo’s Caligula who was owned by Greg Mecklem of Pacific Crest Accoyo America. If you own a Caligula relative, you qualify for membership. In the future, additional elite males who have sired a large number of cria will be added.
IAC MARKETING
The IAC serves its members in two ways. The first is, as previously discussed, a science based, National Herd Improvement Program. The second service is an Internet-based alpaca marketing co-op. Participating members enjoy the following benefits.
1. Inclusion on a state by state alpaca breeders map located on the IAC website.
2. A personalized farm page on the IAC website complete with farm directions, member identification and farm goals.
3. Branded marketing material.
4. Multiple links from the IAC website to the members farm website.
5. Posting of IAC progeny pictures and production data on the website.
6. A Co-op website optimized for each search engine with over 700 first and second page search rankings for the most searched alpaca keywords.
There are many additional membership benefits that you can discover by logging on to www.ideal-alpaca.com or by talking with a current member of the IAC.
The most significant benefit IAC members enjoy is the ability to offer their customers membership in the IAC. Once a new breeder buys breeding stock that is infused with IAC reference genetics, they are eligible to participate in the improvement program and the marketing co-op. IAC members are the leading source of these genetics and can offer their clients the value added proposition of joining the IAC. Alpaca breeders employing EPD selection strategies are the future of the breed. Together we can find the next “Native Dancer” and develop multiple breeds of alpaca. EPDs will allow us to find the next breed changing sire or dam. Julio Barreda once said to me “my goal is to breed alpacas that grow 20 pounds of 20 micron fleece every year.” I thought to myself that should be my goal as well, now with the availability of EPDs I believe I can and so can you.
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