Avalon Meadows Equestrian Center is set on 25 acres of lush fields in Otisfield, Maine - less than a twenty minute drive from Norway, Oxford, Casco Services Boarding, Training, Lessons. MY BOY LUKE 16.3 HANDS + COLORS OF FALL 17 HANDS - horse breeding - horse mating - to do this without hand breeding with these expensive horses MAKE SURE YOUR MARE IS FULLY IN HEAT AND THAT YOU HAVE A GENTLE STALLION!! - this is breeding in a riding arena rather than hand breeding or in a field - it is natural and you can still keep an eye on them.
Look up Breeding or breeding in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. |
Breeding is sexual reproduction that produces offspring, usually animals or plants. It can only occur between a male and a female animal or plant.
Breeding may refer to:
- Breeding in the wild, the natural process of reproduction in the animal kingdom
- Animal husbandry, through selected specimens such as dogs, horses, and rabbits
- Plant breeding, through specimens selected by humans for desirable traits
Science[edit]
- Breeding refers to nuclear transmutations that produce fuel for further reactions, in a breeder reactor to become fissile material or in a fusion reactor to produce tritium, see Tritium#Lithium
Biology[edit]
- Breeding back, a breeding effort to re-assemble extinct breed genes
- Breeding pair, bonded animals who cooperate to produce offspring
- Breeding program, a planned breeding of animals or plants
- Breeding season, the period during each year when a species reproduces
- Captive breeding, raising plants or animals in zoos or other controlled conditions
- Cooperative breeding, the raising of the young using non-parental care givers
- Crossbreeding, the process of breeding an animal with purebred parents of two different breeds, varieties, or populations
- Preservation breeding, a selection practice to preserve bloodlines
- Selective breeding, an animal selection practice to encourage chosen qualities
- Smart breeding, a plant selection practice to encourage chosen qualities
People[edit]
- James Floyd Breeding (1901–1977), U.S. Congressman from Kansas
- Marv Breeding (1934–2006), 1960s U.S. Major League Baseball player
Media[edit]
- Breeding (EP), 2007 album by Dirty Little Rabbits
- Breeding Death, 2000 album by Bloodbath
- Breeding the Spawn, 1993 album by Suffocation
- Dust Breeding, 2001 Doctor Who television series audio play
Places[edit]
- Breeding, Kentucky, a town in the United States
See also[edit]
- Hybrid (biology), breeding between dissimilar parents
- Inbreeding, breeding between close relatives
- Manners, the unenforced standards of human conduct
- Outbreeding depression, reduced fitness from breeding of unrelated individuals
- Breeding
- Selection
- Breeding systems
- The genetic code (DNA) and immunogenetics
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Join Britannica's Publishing Partner Program and our community of experts to gain a global audience for your work! Albert E. FreemanAnimal breeding, controlled propagation of domestic animals in order to improve desirable qualities. Humanity has been modifying domesticated animals to better suit human needs for centuries. Selective breeding involves using knowledge from several branches of science. These include genetics, statistics, reproductive physiology, computer science, and molecular genetics. This article discusses the basic principles of how populations of animals can be changed by application of these principles, and a brief discussion of molecular genetics, immunogenetics, and newer reproductive technologies is included. The fundamental biological principles underlying animal breeding are discussed in the articles heredity and animal reproductive system.
Breeding and variation
English agriculturist Robert Bakewell was a very successful breeder of commercial livestock in the 18th century. His work was based on the traditional method of visual appraisal of the animals that he selected. Although he did not write about his methods, it is recorded that he traveled extensively by horseback and collected sheep and cattle that he considered useful. It is thought that he made wide outcrosses of diverse breeds, and then practiced inbreeding with the intent of fixing desirable characteristics in the crossbred animals. He was also the first to systematically let his animals for stud. For these reasons he is generally recognized as the first scientific breeder.
In animal breeding, a population is a group of interbreeding individuals—i.e., a breed or strain within a breed that is different in some aspects from other breeds or strains. Typically, certain animals within a breed are designated as purebred. The essential difference between purebred and nonpurebred animals is that the genealogy of purebred animals has been carefully recorded, usually in a herd book, or studbook, kept by some sanctioning association. Purebred associations provide other services that are useful to their members to enhance their businesses.
Selective breeding utilizes the natural variations in traits that exist among members of any population. Breeding progress requires understanding the two sources of variation: genetics and environment. For some traits there is an interaction of genetics and the environment. Differences in the animals’ environment, such as amount of feed, care, and even the weather, may have an impact on their growth, reproduction, and productivity. Such variations in performance because of the environment are not transmitted to the next generation. For most traits measured in domestic animals, the environment has a larger impact on variation than do genetic differences. For example, only about 30 percent of the variation in milk production in dairy cattle can be attributed to genetic effects; the remainder of the variation is due to environmental effects. Thus, environmental factors must be considered and controlled in selecting breeding stock.
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Genetic variation is necessary in order to make progress in breeding successive generations. Each gene, which is the basic unit of heredity, occupies a specific location, or locus, on a chromosome. Two or more genes may be associated with a specific locus and therefore with a specific trait. (Traits that can be observed directly, such as size, colour, shape, and so forth, make up an organism’s phenotype.) These genes are known as alleles. If paired alleles are the same, the organism is called homozygous for that trait; if they are different, the organism is heterozygous. Typically, one of the alleles will be expressed to the exclusion of the other allele, in which case the two alleles are referred to as dominant and recessive, respectively. However, sometimes neither dominates, in which case the two alleles are called codominant.
Although no complete knowledge of the genetic makeup of any breed of livestock exists yet, genetic variations can be used for improving stock. Researchers partition total genetic variation into additive, dominance, and epistatic types of gene action, which are defined in the following paragraphs. Additive variation is easiest to use in breeding because it is common and the effect of each allele at a locus just adds to the effect of other alleles at that same locus. Genetic gains made using additive genetic effects are permanent and cumulate from one generation to the next.
Although dominance variation is not more complex in theory, it is more difficult to control in practice because of how one allele masks the effect of another. For example, let a indicate a locus, with a1 and a2 representing two possible alleles at that location. Then a1a1, a1a2 (which is identical to a2a1), and a2a2 are the three possible genotypes. If a1 dominates a2, the genotypes a1a2 and a1a1 cannot be outwardly distinguished. Thus, the inability to observe differences between a1a2 and a1a1 presents a major difficulty in using dominance variance in selective breeding.
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Additive and dominance variations are caused by genes at one locus. Epistatic variation is caused by the joint effects of genes at two or more loci. There has been little deliberate use of this type of genetic variation in breeding because of the complex nature of identifying and controlling the relevant genes.
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