Genetics of some reproduction traits in some sheep breeds from India: A review

Abstract

Sheep farming is a major source of income for small and marginal farmers of the country besides providing nutritional security during crises. Sheep constitute an important AnGR (Animal Genetic Resource) of the country. For any sheep improvement program, reproductive traits are essential. However, compared with production traits such as growth and wool traits, reproduction traits have received very little emphasis in selection programmes owing to their lower heritability, due to their closer association with fitness traits. Therefore, an attempt is being made in this article to accumulate the research efforts of various researchers and animal scientists on various reproduction traits of various sheep breeds of India.