Abstract
DR. T. M. OLBRYCHT1 finds it difficult to believe that our N–type coat2 can have a comparatively simple genetic basis. That conclusion was adopted very tardily here, as papers published show3,4 and, as stated before, we have bred a few N–type animals in which, from breeding data, the genetic basis is regarded as multifactorial. In these animals, we suspect, the factors responsible interact to produce very high abundance of halo–hairs in geometric, not just additive, fashion. The early experiments dealt in differences in the abundance of halo–hairs on the back of not–N lambs, and revealed strong multifactorial inheritance. Lambs are graded by eye when not more than a few days old. N–type has one halo–hair to an average of about nine curly–tip fibres. In not–N six grades are distinguished, ranging from no halo–hairs at all in Grade I to one halo–hair to about 200 curly–tip fibres in Grade IV, and one to about 27 in Grade VI. Lambs of high Grade VI may be called borderline–N, and for our present purpose all Grade VI lambs are called near–N. There is good evidence, strengthened in 1940, that some near–N animals carry the same factors for N–type as typical N–type sheep of our ‘mendelian’ stock. In determining ratios, N and near–N are counted together, but it will be seen that the near–N lambs are few compared with the N–type. We now give the results up to 1940 most pertinent to the point at issue.
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References
NATURE, 147, 57 (1941).
NATURE, 145, 390 (1940).
N. Z. J. Agrie., 46, 1 (1933); 47, 5 (1933).
J. Text. Inst., 26 (1935).
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DRY, F., SUTHERLAND, J. A Mendelian Situation in the Birthcoat of the New Zealand Romney Lamb. Nature 148, 563 (1941). https://doi.org/10.1038/148563a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/148563a0
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