Application of the first canonical variable in the evaluation of animal production trials

Abstract

The objective of this work was to evaluate the inter treatment discrimination according to feed conversion efficiency in several animal performance experiments. The variables investigated were: feed conversion ratio (FCR = intake: production ratio), feed efficiency index (FEI = production: intake ratio) and bio-nutritional index (BNI). The BNI was constructed from the first canonical variable obtained based on the multivariate analysis of variance of the intake and animal production (weight gain or milk production) variables. The results indicated that FCR and FEI reciprocated each other at experimental plot level but did not reciprocate at animal group or treatment level. This fact implicates distortions on the descriptive levels of probability of type I error for hypotheses tests and compromises the statistical and animal production inferences. On the other hand, the BNI index guarantees the maximum discrimination among experimental groups and allows to identify significant differences, which were not observe with FCR or FEI indexes. This fact can be associated to the incorporation of animal production intensity characteristics using BNI.