Raising double-muscled breed cattle and their crossbreds in the tropics: insight from growth models

Vet World Vol.17 July-2024 Article - 10

Research Article

Veterinary World, 17(7): 1504-1513

https://doi.org/10.14202/vetworld.2024.1504-1513

Ummi Noorhakimah Abdullah^1,2, and Goh Yong Meng^1,3

1. Department of Preclinical Sciences, Faculty Veterinary Medicine, Universiti Putra Malaysia, 43400 Serdang, Selangor, Malaysia.
2. Department of Veterinary Services, Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security, 62624 Putrajaya, Malaysia.
3. Institute of Tropical Agriculture and Food Security, Universiti Putra Malaysia, 43400 Serdang, Selangor, Malaysia.

Background and Aim: In tropical conditions, modeling the predictive parameters of live weight, including those at birth, pre-weaning, post-weaning, finishing, and maturing, and the average daily gain, is challenging. The heat load significantly influences the growth rate and final mature weights in the tropics. The study compared the growth rates of Kedah-Kelantan (KK), Brahman (BRAH), and Belgian Blue (BB) crossbred calves.

Materials and Methods: The study conducted growth analysis using the non-linear regression growth models as it approximates the sex, breed, and growth physiology changes in beef cattle. It is supported by the utility of the most common growth functions (Brody, Logistic, von Bertalanffy, and Richard’s model) in normal-muscled tropical breeds and double-muscled crossbred beef cattle in the tropics.

Results: The BB crossbreds outperformed the KK and BRAH breeds by 50%–100% in live weight gains under tropical conditions. The crossbreds display the double-muscled effect and highlight the advantages of heterosis, making them suitable for upgrading local herds. The study’s findings on the growth characteristics of BB crossbred cattle were best described by the von Bertalanffy growth model, which had a high coefficient of determination (R2 > 0.8) and yielded estimated mature weights of 527.5 kg for males and 518.5 kg for females.

Conclusion: According to results, raising BB crossbreds in the tropics as a solution to ensure a sustainable beef supply could yield significant growth and economic benefits.

Keywords: beef cattle, Belgian blue crossbreds, Brahman, double-muscled, growth performance, Kedah-Kelantan, non-linear regression growth functions.

How to cite this article: Abdullah UN, and Meng GY (2024) Raising double-muscled breed cattle and their crossbreds in the tropics: insight from growth models, Veterinary World, 17(7): 1504-1513.

Received: 2024-11-01 Accepted: 2024-06-05 Published online: 2024-07-13

Corresponding author: Goh Yong Meng E-mail: ymgoh@upm.edu.my

DOI: 10.14202/vetworld.2024.1504-1513

Copyright: Abdullah, et al. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http:// creativecommons.org/ publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated.