Dynamics of genealogical structure of breeding stock of black-and-white cattle population of the Vologda oblast and prospects for its development

The research was carried out in order to study the changes in the genealogical structure of the black-and-white cattle population of the Vologda Oblast over the eighteen-year period and to determine the prospects for its further development. The novelty of the study is that the analysis of the genealogical structure dynamics covers the period from 2001 to 2018 for the first time; based on the analysis of the modern genealogical structure, the prospects for the development of the main genealogical lines of black-and-white breed in the population of the Vologda Oblast are defined. The work used conventional methods of statistical processing and visualization of data. The basis of the study was made up by the works of domestic scientists, information databases of IAS “Seleks”, catalogues of the region’s breeding enterprises, yearbooks on breeding in dairy cattle raising in the farms of the Russian Federation. In the population of the black-and-white dairy cattle breed of the Vologda Oblast, an intensive growth in the number of breeding stock of Holstein breeding lines was established. Over 18 years, the proportion of these animals increased by 71.4% and on January 1, 2019 amounted to 85.6%. At the same time, the proportion of black-and-white breed lines of Dutch and East Frisian origin decreased from 74.4 to 8.2%. In the genealogical structure of the modern population of the black-and-white breed, there is a narrowing of the gene pool - 81.8% of the breeding stock of the region’s breeding farms belong to three lines of Holstein breeding: Wis Burke Ideal 1013415, Reflection Sovereign 198998, Montvic Chieftain 95679. It was established that 93.7% of animals in the lines of the black-and-white breed have a pedigree in the Holstein breed. The main directions of further development of the genealogical structure of the breed is the need to preserve the gene pool of the black-and-white breed lines and the reorganization of the Holstein breeding lines. The results of the study will serve as the basis for the development of a breeding system with lines in the population of black-and-white breed.