Morphological structure of South African Boer goats explained by principal component analysis

Abstract

Goats are a source of income in rural areas as they require less management. The current study was conducted to investigate the relationship between morphological traits and define which traits best describe the body conformation. In this study, 141 Boer goats (117 females and 24 males) were used. The Pearson’s correlation, principal component analysis (PCA) and stepwise regression analysis were used for data analysis. Correlation results revealed an association among traits ranging from 0.11 to 0.74 in females with withers height (WH) and rump height (RH) being highly positively significant. In males, it ranged from 0.10 to 0.75 with body weight (BW) and body length (BL) being highly positively significant. Two and one principal components (PCs) were extracted from the female and male, respectively, and accounted for 78.31% and 56.83% of the variation. The regression results suggested that PC could predict body weight, giving more precise results than the original correlation traits. In conclusion, this study indicated that PCA described the morphological structure of Boer goats. Therefore, the findings of the study might predict the body weight in Boer goats with improved accuracy than the original correlated variables.