Abstract
There are four Czech horse breeds: Silesian Noriker, Czech-Moravian Belgian, Old Kladruber (grey and black colour variety) and Hutsul included among the endangered breeds (Genetic Resources). These populations are currently closed to outside breeding. Effective population size is an important parameter used to assess genetic diversity for conservation program in these endangered breeds. Pedigree records for reference population, which included animals born in a 14-year period (from 1996 to 2010) were used for calculation. Realized effective population size was estimated from the individual rate in coancestry, from the individual increase in inbreeding and as effective population size based on population sex ratio. The values of effective population sizes were found low for all four analysed breeds. The results shown, that calculation based on population sex ratio gives overestimated values of effective population size. The approaches using either individual increase in inbreeding or individual increase in coancestry are more accurate and useful.
Highlights
Text, Small population bears the risk of reduction in genetic diversity
A reduction in genetic diversity is connected with the parameter of effective population size which is used to design the strategy for the conservation of endangered animal species
Increase in coancestry is slightly affected by population structure (Gutierrez et al, 2008) and the effective population size can be estimated from increase in coancestry instead of increase in inbreeding when dealing with structured population (Caballero, 1994)
Summary
The objective of conservation breeding is to maintain genetic diversity in the population of farm animals. A reduction in genetic diversity is connected with the parameter of effective population size which is used to design the strategy for the conservation of endangered animal species. Preservation of endangered species is one of the most important goals for the present biological science. Conservation programs are needed to preserve breeds in which a significant part of given species’ genetic diversity still presents negative effects of inbreeding. The effective population size is an important parameter in population genetics and indicates the genetic viability of populations. The objective of present paper was to estimate effective population size with different approaches and select the most suitable one for breeding strategies planning of these endangered breeds
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