Czech J. Anim. Sci., 2026, 71(2):59-66 | DOI: 10.17221/135/2025-CJAS

Genetic and genomic parameters of piglet birth-weight traits and litter size in Czech Large White and Landrace sowsOriginal Paper

Eliška Žáková ORCID..., Emil Krupa ORCID..., Zuzana Krupová ORCID...
1 Institute of Animal Science, Prague – Uhříněves, Czech Republic

This study aimed to estimate heritabilities of piglet birth-weight traits and to investigate the relationships between piglet birth-weight and litter-size traits using field data from Czech Large White and Landrace sows. Data including 86 241 piglets from 5 536 litters were analysed using repeatability, genetic, and genomic models. The investigated piglet-weight traits included arithmetic mean birth weight (MBW), within-litter standard deviation (SDBW), coefficient of variation in birth weight (CVBW), and the proportion of small piglets in the litter (SMALL). Heritability rates of piglet-weight traits were low, with the highest estimates for MBW (0.06–0.10) and SMALL (0.08–0.17), depending on the model used, while the other within-litter variability traits showed heritability rates from 0.03 to 0.05. The heritability rates of litter-size traits, including the number of piglets born alive (NBA) and the number of piglets weaned (NW), were low and ranged from 0.05 to 0.07. The realised accuracies of prediction were moderate to high, ranging from 0.50 to 0.72 for piglet-weight traits and from 0.54 to 0.77 for litter-size traits, with ssGBLUP improving realised accuracy by 4–15% in comparison to BLUP. Genetic correlations estimated using BLUP and ssGBLUP indicated that litter size at birth (NBA) tended to be negatively associated with MBW and positively or weakly associated with piglet-weight variability traits (SDBW, CVBW, and SMALL), whereas NW tended to show positive correlations with MBW and negative correlations with variability traits. However, none of the correlations were statistically significant.

Keywords: genetic correlation; heritability; litter size; pig; piglet variability

Received: October 2, 2025; Accepted: January 29, 2026; Prepublished online: February 24, 2026; Published: February 26, 2026  Show citation

ACS AIP APA ASA Harvard Chicago Chicago Notes IEEE ISO690 MLA NLM Turabian Vancouver
Žáková E, Krupa E, Krupová Z. Genetic and genomic parameters of piglet birth-weight traits and litter size in Czech Large White and Landrace sows. Czech Journal of Animal Science. 2026;71(2):59-66. doi: 10.17221/135/2025-CJAS.
Share...
Download citation
  • BibTeX (.bib)
  • Bookends (.ris)
  • EasyBib (.ris)
  • EndNote (.enw)
  • EndNote 8 (.xml)
  • ISI WoS (.isi)
  • Medlars (.medlars)
  • Mendeley (.ris)
  • MODS (.xml)
  • Papers (.ris)
  • RefWorks (.txt)
  • RefManager (.ris)
  • RIS (.ris)
  • MS Word (.xml)
  • Zotero (.ris)
    • Open full article

    References

    1. Alves K, Schenkel FS, Brito LF, Robinson A. Estimation of direct and maternal genetic parameters for individual birth weight, weaning weight, and probe weight in Yorkshire and Landrace pigs. J Anim Sci. 2018 Jun 29;96(7):2567-78. Go to original source... Go to PubMed...
    2. Boonkum W, Permthongchoochai S, Chankitisakul V, Duangjinda M. Genetic strategies for enhancing litter size and birth weight uniformity in piglets. Front Vet Sci. 2025 Mar 24;12:1512701. Go to original source... Go to PubMed...
    3. Camargo EG, Marques DBD, Figueiredo EAP, Silva FF, Lopes PS. Genetic study of litter size and litter uniformity in Landrace pigs. R Bras Zootec. 2020;49:e20180295. Go to original source...
    4. Chou JY, Marchant JN, Nalon E, Huynh TTT, van de Weerd HA, Boyle LA, Ison SH. Investigating risk factors behind piglet facial and sow teat lesions through a literature review and a survey on teeth reduction. Front Vet Sci. 2022 Dec 2;9:1-21. Go to original source... Go to PubMed...
    5. Declerck I, Sarrazin S, Dewulf J, Maes D. Sow and piglet factors determining variation of colostrum intake between and within litters. Animal. 2017 Aug;11(8):1336-43. Go to original source... Go to PubMed...
    6. Formoso-Rafferty N, Cervantes I, Ibanez-Escriche N, Gutierrez JP. Correlated genetic trends for production and welfare traits in a mouse population divergently selected for birth weight environmental variability. Animal. 2016 Nov;10(11):1770-7. Go to original source... Go to PubMed...
    7. Glencorse D, Plush K, Hazel S, D'Souza D, Hebart M. Impact of non-confinement accommodation on farrowing performance: A systematic review and meta-analysis of farrowing crates versus pens. Animals (Basel). 2019 Nov 12;9(11):957. Go to original source... Go to PubMed...
    8. Knap PW, Knol EF, Sorensen AC, Huisman AE, van der Spek D, Zak LJ, Chapatte AG, Lewis CRG. Genetic and phenotypic time trends of litter size, piglet mortality, and birth weight in pigs. Front Anim Sci. 2023 Jul 20;4:1218175. Go to original source...
    9. Krupa E, Wolf J. Simultaneous estimation of genetic parameters for production and litter size traits in Czech Large White and Czech Landrace pigs. Czech J Anim Sci. 2013 Sep;58(9):429-36. Go to original source...
    10. Krupa E, Zakova E, Krupova Z, Michalickova M. Estimation of genetic parameters for teat number and reproduction and production traits from different data sources for Czech dam breeds. Livest Sci. 2016 Sep;191:97-102. Go to original source...
    11. Lee HL, Lin MY, Wang HS, Hsu CB, Lin CY, Chang SC, Shen PC, Chang HL. Direct-maternal genetic parameters for litter size and body weight of piglets of a new black breed for the Taiwan black hog market. Animals (Basel). 2022 Nov 25;12(23):3295. Go to original source... Go to PubMed...
    12. Lin KH, Flowers B, Knauer M, Lin EC. Estimation of genotype by environmental interaction for litter traits by reaction norm model in Taiwan Landrace sows. J Anim Sci. 2024 Jan 3;102:skae189. Go to original source... Go to PubMed...
    13. Masuda Y. Introduction to BLUPF90 suite programs [Internet]. University of Georgia; 2018 Mar [modified 2025 Apr 30; cited 2025 May 10]. Available from: http://nce.ads.uga.edu/wiki/doku.php?id=documentation.
    14. Matheson SM, Walling GA, Edwards SA. Genetic selection against intrauterine growth retardation in piglets: A problem at the piglet level with a solution at the sow level. Genet Sel Evol. 2018 Sep 18;50(1):46. Go to original source... Go to PubMed...
    15. Mbuthia JM, Kasper C, Zenk M, Bee G, Metges CC, Das G. Predicting piglet survival until weaning using birth weight and within-litter birth weight variation as easily measured proxy predictors. Animal. 2025 Apr;19(4):101479. Go to original source... Go to PubMed...
    16. Misztal I, Tsuruta S, Lourenco DAL, Aguilar I, Legarra A, Vitezica Z. Manual for BLUPF90 family of programs [Internet]. University of Georgia; 2014 [modified 2024 May 21; cited 2025 May 30]. Available from: https://nce.ads.uga.edu/wiki/doku.php?id=documentation.
    17. Ogawa S, Konta A, Kimata M, Ishii K, Uemoto Y, Satoh M. Genetic relationship of litter traits between farrowing and weaning in Landrace and Large White pigs. Anim Sci J. 2019 Dec;90(12):1510-6. Go to original source... Go to PubMed...
    18. R Core Team. R: A language and environment for statistical computing [Internet]. R Foundation for Statistical Computing. Vienna, Austria; 2022 [cited 2025 May 30]. Available from: https://www.R-project.org.
    19. Riddersholm KV, Bahnsen I, Bruun TS, de Knegt LV, Amdi C. Identifying risk factors for low piglet birth weight, high within-litter variation and occurrence of intrauterine growth-restricted piglets in hyperprolific sows. Animals (Basel). 2021 Sep 18;11(9):2731. Go to original source... Go to PubMed...
    20. Romero M, Calvo L, Morales JI, Rodriguez AI, Escudero RM, Olivares A, Lopez-Bote C. Short- and long-term effects of birth weight and neonatal care in pigs. Animals (Basel). 2022 Oct 26;12(21):2936. Go to original source... Go to PubMed...
    21. Schoos A, Muro BBD, Carnevale RF, Chantziaras I, Biebaut E, Janssens GPJ, Maes D. Relationship between piglets' survivability and farrowing kinetics in hyper-prolific sows. Porcine Health Manag. 2023 Aug 28;9(1):37. Go to original source... Go to PubMed...
    22. Sell-Kubiak E, Bijma P, Knol EF, Mulder HA. Comparison of methods to study uniformity of traits: Application to birth weight in pigs. J Anim Sci. 2015 Mar;93(3):900-11. Go to original source... Go to PubMed...
    23. Vande Pol KD, Bautista RO, Harper H, Shull CM, Brown CB, Ellis M. Effect of within-litter birth weight variation after cross-fostering on piglet preweaning growth and mortality. Transl Anim Sci. 2021a Mar 1;5(3):txab039. Go to original source... Go to PubMed...
    24. Vande Pol KD, Bautista RO, Olivo A, Harper H, Shull CM, Brown CB, Ellis M. Effect of rearing cross-fostered piglets in litters of differing size relative to sow functional teat number on preweaning growth and mortality. Transl Anim Sci. 2021b Oct 2;5(4):txab193. Go to original source... Go to PubMed...
    25. Zaalberg RM, Chu TT, Bovbjerg H, Jensen J, Villumsen TM. Genetic parameters for early piglet weight, litter traits and number of functional teats in organic pigs. Animal. 2023 Mar;17(3):100717. Go to original source... Go to PubMed...

    This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0.), which permits non-comercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original publication is properly cited. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.


    Return to the content