Multivariate analysis of morphometric traits of Malaimadu cattle—autochthonous draft cattle of south India

Abstract

Malaimadu cattle is a less explored indigenous cattle germplasm reared in the Western Ghats area of Tamil Nadu, south India. This study aimed to analyse the morphological structure of the Malaimadu cattle using a multivariate approach that explains best represent body conformation. Sixteen body measurements were obtained from 156 adult female cattle from their native breeding tract. The Nearest Neighbor Method of Hierarchical Cluster analysis was used to group the morphometric traits into clusters. Pearson's coe cients of correlation (r) were estimated to determine the phenotypic correlations between different body measurements. Traits were analysed using varimax rotated principal component analysis (PCA) with Kaiser normalization. Cluster analysis categorises morphometric traits into two distinct clusters with the rst cluster formed by traits related to horns and face, while the second cluster denotes general body conformation. Out of 120 phenotypic correlations, 55 were signi cant of which 51 were positive correlations. The estimated correlation coe cient ranges between − 0.50 (body length and face width) to 0.85 (chest girth and body weight). PCA extracted six components representing 70.19% of total variance, while the rst principal component comprises of chest girth (CG), body weight (BW), Height at wither (HW) and Paunch girth (PG) alone accounts for 23.70% thereby describing the general size and shape of the animal. The multivariate approach has proven to be effective in differentiating Malaimadu cattle from other indigenous breeds of south India with clear morphometric differences that helps in identifying the pure phenotype for future propagation and also for devising breeding strategies.