IMPACT OF BOVINE SOMATOTROPIN (bST) ON THE MILK PRODUCTION AND GENETIC EVALUATION OF HOLSTEIN CATTLE

The objective of this work was to study the influence of the use of bovine somatotropin (bST) on milk yield (MP305) and genetic evaluation of MP305 of Holstein Cattle. Data from 474 bulls and observations concerning 3.341 lactations of 1.271 cows during the period from 1999 to 2003 were used. Variance analysis was performed by the GLM SAS procedure (2003) and parameters in one animal model. The heritability estimates for model 1(bST as a fixed effect) and model 2 (absence of this effect) were respectively 0.26 and 0.23 for the two analyses and correlations between estimated breeding values for bulls sets a (all evaluated), b (best 20%), c (best 10%) and d (best 5%) were, respectively, 0.9484, 0.9829, 0.9752 and 0.8974. Variance analysis of variance showed that the average PL305 increased significantly (P< 0.0001) with the increase number of bST applications. The Spearman correlations coefficients between breeding values of bulls were high, with or without the use of bST in the model, indicating that the use of this technology does not affect the classification of genetically evaluated bulls.