A total of 2054 records of primiparous buffalo cows calved during 2000-2019 was collected from five Egyptian buffalo herds. The studied traits were birth weight (BW), total milk yield (TMY), lactation period (LP), age at first calving (AFC), gestation length (GL), days open (DO), and calving interval (CI). Year and season of calving, sex and herd were used as fixed effects. Genetic parameters were estimated using two models, the first model to estimate variance components and heritability, and the second model was estimated the genetic correlations among studied traits. Results showed that the heritability values were moderate for BW, LP and TMY (0.48, 0.23 and 0.50, respectively), suggesting that genetic improvement programs using the selection could be effective to improve these traits, but all reproductive traits were low, being 0.07, 0.02 0.0 and 0.12 for GL, DO, CI, and AFC, respectively, inferring that these traits could be improved using environmental and marginal conditions. The genetic correlation of the current study indicated that the selection for increasing BW of Egyptian buffalo could be followed by an improvement of TMY, longer LP and GL. The genetic correlation between productive traits and reproductive traits were positive ranged from 0.04 (TMY-AFC) to 0.91 (LP-DO and LP-CI). Selection of buffalo to reproduction traits would be ineffective or take long time because they are influenced by farm management, unlike productive traits.
A total of 2054 records of primiparous buffalo cows calved during 2000-2019 was collected from five Egyptian buffalo herds. The studied traits were birth weight (BW), total milk yield (TMY), lactation period (LP), age at first calving (AFC), gestation length (GL), days open (DO), and calving interval (CI). Year and season of calving, sex and herd were used as fixed effects. Genetic parameters were estimated using two models, the first model to estimate variance components and heritability, and the second model was estimated the genetic correlations among studied traits. Results showed that the heritability values were moderate for BW, LP and TMY (0.48, 0.23 and 0.50, respectively), suggesting that genetic improvement programs using the selection could be effective to improve these traits, but all reproductive traits were low, being 0.07, 0.02 0.0 and 0.12 for GL, DO, CI, and AFC, respectively, inferring that these traits could be improved using environmental and marginal conditions. The genetic correlation of the current study indicated that the selection for increasing BW of Egyptian buffalo could be followed by an improvement of TMY, longer LP and GL. The genetic correlation between productive traits and reproductive traits were positive ranged from 0.04 (TMY-AFC) to 0.91 (LP-DO and LP-CI). Selection of buffalo to reproduction traits would be ineffective or take long time because they are influenced by farm management, unlike productive traits.