Wool growth is influenced by photoperiodic period of different seasons; under similar nutritional conditions, more wool is produced in longer photoperiodic season. In this study, the effects of photoperiod on fiber and skin follicle characteristics of three sheep breeds were studied. Forty non-pregnant and non-milking ewes (Chios, ArkhaMerino × Moghani and Suffolk × Moghani breeds) with a similar age were selected. Equal numbers from each breed were divided into two groups (20 ewes/group), and the two groups were treated with a natural photoperiod (open natural environment: 12 hours light-12 hours dark) and an artificial photoperiod (8 hours light and 16 hours dark) for 50 days. All animals were fed ad libitum with a similar diet including alfalfa, straw and barley at maintenance level. At the end of the treatment period, 50 g of wool was collected from the left mid side area (about 20 cm from the spinal column on the third rib) by a laboratory wool clipper, and a skin biopsy was taken from the right mid side area using a 1 cm diameter trephine. The following fiber characteristics were measured: staple length, fiber diameter, percentage of medullated and non-medullated fibers, wool efficiency. Analyzed follicle characteristics included follicle type ratio, follicle density, and follicle activity. A randomized design analysis of the data and comparison of means were performed with Duncan's new multiple range test. Results indicated that the primary follicle density in sheep under a natural photoperiod were significantly (p<0.01) lower than under an artificial photoperiod. The secondary to primary follicle ratio in sheep under a natural photoperiod were significantly (p<0.01) higher than in sheep under the artificial photoperiod. The percentage of inactive secondary follicles in sheep under the natural photoperiod were significantly (p<0.05) lower than in sheep treated with the artificial photoperiod. Both natural and artificial photoperiod had no effect on fiber characteristics.

Maternal effects on growth traits of 3872 lambs born from 182 rams and to 2274 ewes during 1994 - 2002 in Moghani Sheep Breeding Station were investigated using maternal model and restricted maximum likelihood procedures. Traits were birth weight (BWT), and body weights at 3 (BWT3M), 6 (BWT6M), 9 (BWT9M) and 12 (BWT12M) months of age. With or without taking into effect. The maternal effects, six different animal models were fitted and likelihood ratio test applied to determine the most appropriate model. For BWT, direct additive genetic, maternal additive genetic and maternal permanent environmental effects without a fitting of covariance between direct and maternal additive genetic effects were important. For this trait, estimates of direct heritability (h2a ), maternal heritability (h2m) and maternal permanent environmental variance as a proportion of the phenotypic variance ( pe2) were 0.172 ±0.022, 0.058±0.045 and 0.131±0.038, respectively. For BWT3M and BWT6M, the important sources of variations were direct as well as maternal additive genetic effects. Estimates of h2a and h2m were 0.044±0.037 and 0.075 for BWT3M, and 0.083±0.024 & 0.075±0.040 for BWT6M. None of the maternal effects influenced BWT9M and BWT12M. For these traits, h2a figures were 0.376±0.037 and 0.227±0.059, respectively. Direct additive genetic correlations varied from 0.209 (between BWT and BWT6M) to 0.604 (between BWT and BWT3M). These estimates for maternal additive genetic correlations ranged from 0.574 (between BWT and BWT6M) to 1.000 (between BWT3M and BWT6M). The corresponding estimates for phenotypic correlations varied from 0.168 (between BWT and BWT12M) to 0.843 (between BWT6M and BWT9M).

Introduction: When forage amount and height decrease in the pastures, forage grazing becomes difficult for sheep. Moreover, sheep do not like to graze dead forages and avoid grazing them unless they be forced for supplying their required nutrients. In this conditions, the amount of dietary metabolizable energy decreases and it will be a limiting factor for sheep growth and production. Conventional sheep grazing programs does not provide enough and sustainable nutrients to achieve optimal growth and most of grazing animals experience malnutrition periods and lack of supplying the required nutrients and thereafter they will start to reduce production and growth rate. A pasture-based lamb rearing system can provide better growth rates when the animals were supplemented with concentrate feeds to compensate the pasture deficiencies. Supplementation of concentrate feeds in addition to free grazing in pastures has significantly improved sheep production and increased growth performance in lambs. Identifying the genetic potential of Iranian sheep ecotypes and creating appropriate mixtures in integrated rearing systems (combining pasture grazing and concentrate feeds) can lead to higher efficiency. Therefore, the aim of the present study was to investigate the effect of different levels of concentrate on the growth performance of weaned Moghani and Romanov-Moghani crossbreed lambs under grazing conditions. Material and Methods: This study was conducted using 32 weaned Moghani and Romanov-Moghani cross-bred lambs with an average weight of 24±7 kg in a completely randomized design with 4 treatments based on a 2×2 factorial experiment. The experiment was conducted in two stages over 8 months. The first stage was carried out for 3 months (feeding period) and the experimental treatments included 1) Moghani lambs without concentrate supplement feeding, 2) Moghani lambs fed with 250 grams per day of concentrate supplement per lamb, 3) Romanov-Moghani cross-breed lambs without concentrate supplement feeding and 4) Romanov-Moghani cross-breed lambs fed with 250 grams per day of concentrate supplement per lamb. The second stage was carried out for 5 months and all experimental groups were deprived of receiving concentrate supplement (non-feeding period). Lambs were weighed every two weeks and monthly for up to 3 months after the end of the feeding period to determine weight gain and biometric parameters. A 25×25 cm wooden plots were used to measure pasture phytomass production. Plants in the plots were cut from about one centimeter above the ground and collected in a bag. After air drying in the shadow, they were used to analyze and identify the type of plant species. To determine diet digestibility, a fecal collection bag was used that was tied to the animal's rump for 2 consecutive days and done for two occasions (days 45 and 90 of rearing). Blood samples were taken from the jugular vein after the lambs returned from the pasture and 3 hours after hand-feeding the concentrate supplement, and analyzed for blood metabolites including glucose, urea, total protein, albumin, cholesterol, and triglycerides by using commercial kits. Results and discussion: The results of the present study showed that feeding concentrate supplement improved the growth status of lambs compared to the group without concentrate supplement, which had a significant effect in the first month, the third month and the entire of feeding period, but genotype had no effect on growth performance. The effect of adding concentrate supplement to the diet of lambs grazing on pasture was also effective during the period without feeding, so that the effect of feeding had a significant effect on the growth of lambs in all months without feeding. In addition, the effect of genotype had a significant effect in the fourth, fifth, seventh months and for the entire of the without feeding period. Concentrate supplement feeding increased significantly the concentration of blood urea and glucose. However, it had no significant effect on the concentrations of blood total protein, triglyceride and cholesterol. The genotype factor had a significant effect on urea concentration. Among the different biometric traits, the animal height showed a significant increase by the effect of feeding concentrate supplement and the interaction effect of genotype by feeding. Chest circumference was affected by the interaction effect of genotype on feeding. Supplemental feeding of concentrate had a significant effect on body length, chest circumference, height and pin width during the period without feeding. Conclusion: Based on the results obtained, daily feeding of 250 grams of concentrate supplement is recommended when raising lambs in pasture grazing conditions. In addition, based on the results obtained, lambs of Moghani breed performed better than Moghani-Romanov cross-bred lambs under pasture rearing systems.

Introduction: Moghani sheep, one of the dominant meat breeds among Iranian sheep, is known for its good body size, resistance to changes in weather conditions, and capacity to produce heavy-weight lambs. The Romanov breed is known worldwide for its early sexual maturity, long breeding season, and high productivity. Among high-yielding breeds, the Romanov breed achieves higher twinning and fertility, higher weight of ewes, optimal shelf life of lambs, and heavier final weight of lambs. During past years, increasing productivity of Iranian native sheep breeds, including the Moghani breed, has been implemented through cross-breeding with high-yielding foreign breeds such as the Romanov breed to improve growth and twining rates and reduce size of the fat-tail. Crossbreeding is a way to improve poor production and reproductive characteristics of livestock. Due to the lack of information regarding the fattening performance and carcass characteristics of the Romanov-Moghani crossbreeds, the aim of this study was to investigate the fattening performance carcass characteristics, blood parameters, feed intake and digestibility of Moghani and Romanov-Moghani crossbreed fattening lambs under diets with different energy levels.Materials and Methods: This research was conducted using 24 male lambs (10 Moghani lambs and 10 Romanov-Moghani cross-bred lambs) as a factorial design with 4 experimental groups and 6 replications (lambs) in each group. The duration of the experiment was 75 days. The experimental groups in this research include: 1) Moghani lambs fed low energy diet, 2) Moghani lambs fed high energy diet, 3) Romanov-Moghani lambs fed low energy diet, 4) Romanov-Moghani lambs fed high energy diet. A rumen-protected energy powder (Energizer RP-10, IFFCO, Johor, Malaysia) was used to increase the energy level in high-energy diets. Fattening performance was measured by weighing the lambs every two weeks. At the end of the experiment, all the lambs were slaughtered and the carcass characteristics, including hot carcass percentage, cold carcass percentage, tail percentage, and back fat thickness were measured. After 24 hours of storage in 4ºC, back-fat thickness between the 14th and 13th vertebras were measured with a digital caliper. Blood samples were drawn from the jugular vein of all lambs 3 hours after feed consumption, and the samples were immediately centrifuged at 3500 rpm for 15 minutes then the plasma samples were frozen at -20 ºC till analysis day determining concentrations of blood parameters including glucose, blood urea nitrogen, cholesterol, triglyceride, total protein, albumin, and globulin were determined using commercial kits and spectrophotometer. All the data were analyzed in the form of a completely random design and factorial experiment using the GLM method for statistical analysis.Results and Discussion: The results showed that Moghani lambs had significantly more tail percentage and lower tailless carcass percentage than Romanov-Moghani mixed lambs. Feeding a diet with a higher level of energy by feeding protected rumen fat decreased the percentage of the tail and increased the percentage of the carcass without the tail. Moghani lambs fed with high-energy diet had the highest back fat thickness compared to all groups. On the other hand, the average daily weight gain was only influenced by the energy level of the diet. Based on the results, Romanov-Moghani crossbred lambs had a higher weight gain than Moghani lambs, and feeding fat supplement improved livestock performance. Due to the fact that no significant difference was observed in the feed consumption of lambs due to fat supplement feeding, therefore, the better fattening performance of lambs in the groups fed with fat supplement can be attributed to the increase in energy intake in these animals as well as the higher efficiency of the metabolic energy conversion of fats compared to carbohydrates (McDonald et al., 2012). Based on the obtained results, Romanov-Moghani cross-bred lambs had a higher weight gain than pure lambs, and also fat supplement feeding improved the performance of livestock. Therefore, crossbreeding fat-tailed Moghani breed with a tailless breed such as Romanov can be considered as an efficient method to reduce carcass tail percentage and improve carcass yield. On the other hand, providing energy in the form of fat may also result in a relative decrease in the tail percentage.Conclusion: In general, the results of this experiment indicated that crossbreeding fat-tailed Moghani breed with a tailless breed like Romanov can be considered as an efficient method to reduce tail percentage and improve carcass yield. On the other hand, providing energy in the form of fat may also lead to a relative decrease in tail percentage.

The objective of this study was to determine the inbreeding depression on growth traits in Moghani sheep. Pedigree information of 8836 animals collected during the years of 1987 to 2006 by Moghani Breed Center in Jafar Abad Moghan, were used for analysis. The base population year was 1988. Analysis of the records was performed by ASReml software. Inbreeding depression was estimated as the regression of performance on the individual inbreeding coefficients via fitting an animal model. The mean inbreeding for all animals, females and males, were 0.500, 0.515 and 0.484 %, respectively. Totally, 24.22 % of all the animals were inbred. The mean of inbreeding for inbreed animals was 2.062 %. The rate of increased inbreeding per year for all animals was 0.05%. The inbreeding depression for body weight traits at birth, 3, 6, 9 and 12 months of age was, respectively, -0.007, - 0.291, - 0.026, -0.018 and -0.041 kg, per 1% increase in individual coefficient.

The aim of this study was to compare the characteristics of wool from Arkhamerino, Ghezel and Moghani crosses. In order to evaluate fleece characteristics, wool samples were obtained from 176 Arkhamerino×Ghezel (ARG) and 80 Arkhamerino×Moghani (ARM) F1 crosses (aged 9-15 months). Samples were taken in spring from right mid-side during a period of three years (1999-2001). Fleece characteristics including fiber diameter (FD), fiber diameter variability (CVd), staple length (SL), kemp (KP) and medulation (MP) percentage were analyzed. Average fleece characteristics of FD, CVd, SL, KP and MP for ARG were 27.11±0.25m, 36.6±0.59%, 11.94±0.32 cm, 1.56±0.35% and 7.33±0.72% and for ARM were 26.18±0.46m, 36.16±0.97, 10.95±0.39cm, 2.27±0.29 and 8.82±0.91, respectively. Data were analyzed for genotype, sex, birth year and birth type by general linear model (Glm) and the age of sheep (or lambs) considered as a cofactor in statistical model. The genotype had a significant (P<0.05) effect on FD and ARM crosses had produced finer wool. Sex significantly (P<0.05) affected FD, CVd and SL. Females had finer wool with higher CV and longer staple. Year of birth had significant (P<0.05) effect on SL (P<0.05). F1 crosses which were born in 2000 had shorter staples. The interaction of genotype and the year of birth significantly (P<0.05) affected CVd. Type of birth had no significant effect on fleece characteristics.

Introduction: Improving animal performance should be sustainable and economically profitable, therefore economic selection indices have been used in most breeding programmes for livestock. For this purpose, economic weighting factors have to be estimated for all traits in the breeding objective. The best way to maximize profitability through genetic improvement is to use economic weights of the trait Involved. In this study, to estimate the economic values of production and reproduction traits, Costs, revenues and profit analysis in nomadic systems, determine the breeding objective for Moghani sheep. The human population is growing fast which it seems that in spite of the recent progresses in new issues and technologies, they are not enough to fulfill feed requirements of humankind. Planning a suitable breeding system would be an important practical method in using the production potential of local sheep flocks. Therefore, it is essential to estimate economic values of production traits in a one or multivariate selection scheme to evaluate the priority in-comes and costs of a breeding system. A bio-economic model was used to describe performance, revenues and costs and to calculate the economic values, economic values are determined from these models by simulating changes in the genetic level of a trait and noting the associated changes in overall economic outcome. As a first step in developing such a programme a suitable breeding goal for the cattle population has to be defined, giving emphasis to production as well as to functional traits in order to achieve a more sustainable production. For a sustainable production, traits that have been identified as important for selection are also functional traits. The economic value of a trait is defined as the increase in profit resulting from a unit genetic improvement in that trait, while all other traits in the breeding objective are kept constant in simple terms economic values are defined as the effect on the efficiency of production of a marginal unit increase in a trait, independent of changes in other traits. Economic efficiency of the production system was calculated as the difference between total revenues and total costs per cow and year at the stationary herd structure. Materials and Methods: In this study, production, reproduction, management and economic parameters resulted from recording of 5 flocks with 500 head of breeding ewes during annual cycle of production (August 2015 to August 2016) in extensive rearing system were used to determine the breeding objective and relative economic values. Traits included; fertility, pregnancy rate, weight lambs from birth to the end of period, survival rate of lambs, wool production weight, average daily gain and milk production. A bioeconomic model was written for rearing system and flock information, economic values using maximum profit orientation was calculated by partial derivative of the profit function by the MATLAB software. To calculate economic values, change in system profit per unit change in the trait while was kept the other characters in the average, and was considered the average change in profit as an economic value. To calculate the relative economic values, the absolute economic value of each trait divided by the absolute economic value of weight of wool. First all costs, revenues, profits and flock structure determined then intered input files and run the software. Results and Discussion: Economic analysis of system indicated that, costs, revenue, and profit per ewe per year were 9437617. 88, 10637654. 49, and 1200036. 61 Rials, respectively. The results showed that live weight, milk yield, manure and wool yield accounted for 86. 36 %, 9. 64 %, 2. 85 and 1. 15% of total revenue, respectively. Feeding and management costs (variable costs) represented 73. 65% and 26. 35 % of total cost, respectively. The relative economic values for Carcass yield, Lamb live weight at 12-month, ewe survival, Post-weaning lamb survival, Pre-weaning lamb survival, Lamb live weight at 4-month, birth weight, conception rates ewes, , little size, Lambing frequency per year, Average daily gain yearlings, Wool weight, Milk yield of ewe, Average daily gain lambs, Replacement female weight, Adult weight of ewes were7. 30, 4. 27, 3. 08, 2. 85, 2. 44, 2. 35, 2. 01, 1. 85, 1. 54, 1. 42, 1. 05, 1, 0. 55, 0. 34,-0. 06, and (-1. 81) respectively. Conclusion: Breeding objective in Moghani sheep breed were Carcass yield, Lamb live weight at 12-month, ewe survival, Post-weaning lamb survival, Pre-weaning lamb survival, Lamb live weight at 4-month, birth weight, conception rates ewes, little size, Lambing frequency per year, Average daily gain yearlings, wool weight, Milk yield of ewe, Average daily gain lambs, Replacement female weight and Adult weight of ewes respectively.

Tenderness is one of the important characteristics of meat and desired to consumers. Calpastatin is one of the genes which affects meat quality and growth of the animals. The aim of this study was to determine genotypic variation of calpastatin gene in Iranian Moghani sheep breed using PCRRFLP. For conducting this study, the blood samples of 176 sheep were collected. After extraction of genomic DNA, the L region of exon 1 of calpastatin gene with 622 bp was amplified with specific primers. The Mspl and Neal restriction enzymes were used to cut the PCR products. The mentioned enzymes cut the amplicons in complementary manner and alleles of M and N with frequency of 0.54 and 0.46, respectively were produced. Genetic variation (heterozygosity) in the Moghani sheep breed was moderate (0.49) and the population was in Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium. The results confirmed that the PCR-RFLP can be used to identify different genotypic variation in this breed.

Background and Objectives: Strategies should be considered to increase the growth and production of sheep meat in Iran. Weight prediction of sheep helps to determine the optimal time for slaughter as well as the appropriate feeding program. Weight prediction can be investigated using mathematical models describing growth. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the performance artificial neural networks in predicting the weight of Moghani sheeps during the growth period of the animal up to one year of age. Materials and Methods: In this study, the information related to the weight characteristics of 10726 Moghani sheep from birth to one year old, which were collected during the years 1989 to 2016 in the breeding station of Moghani sheep located in Jafarabad Moghan, Ardabil province, was used. To more investigate the growth curve, a multi-layer perceptron artificial neural network accompanied by the backpropagation algorithm was used in this research. Transfer functions such as tangent axon, sigmoid axon, and hyperbolic linear tangent and training algorithms such as momentum, gradient descent, and Levenberg–Marquardt algorithm were used to design the multi-layer perceptron neural network. After fitting nonlinear models and artificial neural network, goodness-of-fit indices including coefficient of determination R2, MSE and MAE were used to select the best model. Results: The results of this study showed that in the artificial neural network, with three input variables (sex, recording season and age), the hyperbolic axon tangent function and training algorithm of gradient descent was the best performance, with the explanation coefficient, the average square squares, and the average absolute error of 0. 919, 602. 60 and 3. 50, respectively. In the artificial neural network with four input variables (sex, recording season, birth type and age), 1 hidden layer, axon stimulus function, and momentum learning algorithm, had the best performance so that the explanation coefficient, average error squares, and the an absolute error were 0. 923, 123/864 and 2864/864, respectively. In the artificial neural network with five input variables (Sex, season of recording, type of birth, age of mother at birth and age of animal), 1 hidden layer, axon hyperbolic linear tangent stimulus function, and Levenberg–Marquardt algorithm, explanation coefficient, the average square squares, and the mean of the absolute error were 0. 928, 0 and 2. 754, respectively. Conclusion: The results of this study showed that the artificial neural network model used in this research, with very high accuracy, has the ability to predict the weight of Moghani sheep during the animal's growth period up to one year of age. So that the correlation coefficients in using three, four and five input variables to predict the weight of Moghani sheep were 0. 95, 0. 96 and 0. 96, respectively.