Chapter 2: Basics of animal breeding

Animal breeding program

Animal breeding is based on the fact that traits of parents are reflected more or less in their offspring. This is caused by the fact that traits are more or less heritable and that 50 % of the DNA, comprising the heritable ability for the traits of an animal, is passed from a parent to its offspring. In animal breeding potential parents are selected for certain traits and the best ones are indeed used as parents. In this way the next generation will be genetically improved for the desired traits. For the long term the subsequent breeding activities are carried out in a breeding program illustrated in the scheme below:

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