Genetic variability of some Italian and Polish duck breeds

AbstractThis study is aimed to estimate and compare the inter- and within-breed variability of duck populations under genetic conservation programmes. The following four duck breeds were analysed: Germanata Veneta (AGV) and Mignon (AMG) from Italy, Pekin Krajowy (33P) and Pomniejszona (2K) from Poland. The characterisation of the four populations was carried out through a panel of 23 microsatellite markers. The analysis involved 180 individuals: 39 for AGV, 41 for AMG, 50 for 33P and 50 for 2K. An average of 11.36 alleles per locus was identified. Twenty-two loci showed high values of polymorphism information content from 0.575 to 0.912, while CAUD136 was monomorphic for the Italian breeds. The breeds showed relatively high heterozygosity: higher for the Polish populations (0.6920 for 33P and 0.6521 for 2K), and lower for the Italian (0.4497 and 0.3718 for AGV and AMG, respectively). The inbreeding coefficient was higher for the Italian breeds, AMG in particular (0.133, 0.097 and 0.121), as well as the di...