Broadly speaking the following steps have to be taken:
1: Tasks for the Manager
2. Tasks for ZooEasy
Step 1: Tasks for the Manager
The manager of the administration must perform the following analyses on the data. Where possible, every single analysis should be followed by updates.
ZooEasy can also help you with this: through the web shop the Analyze Mean kinship module service can be purchased. For this, an estimate of hours will be issued in advance, after which the service can be ordered with the number of hours. On average this will take us between 4 and 8 hours.
1a: Analysis of inbreeding
When large numbers of animals still have to be calculated in order to be allocated an inbreeding percentage, this may indicate one or more pedigree loops. Using Extended search on the Animals menu, you can specify for inbreeding percentages a range from = -1 and to -1. This shows the number of animals to which this applies. If this number is low or can be explained by a very recent import (may be 2 days ago) then no further actionis needed. If the number is high and / or cannot be explained, a data analysis must be performed via PopRep. Any pedigree loops must be corrected.
1b: Analysis of the number of live animals
The lower the numbers, the easier the calculation can be completed.
1c: Analysis of the age of animals
What is a realistic maximum age for the breed? The administrator can set this age via an update import as the fictitious date of death for all living animals of the correct sexes. In Excel, a fictitious date of death can easily be calculated for the “still living” animals based on the date of birth. Any animals that are still alive can always be updated in the program afterwards in the application.
1d: Analysis of gender
How many animals are listed with gender Unknown? In a pedigree, these will be ‘opposite’ the selected animal and with that, for example, 2 male or 2 female animals could be shown in a pedigree as parents of an animal. And are the sexes of the animals correct? Is an animal listed as father, but is the gender (in the detail screen) female? And vice versa. This can be easily analyzed in Excel via an export.
1e: Purchase of Mean kinship module
The Mean kinship module can be purchased in the web shop.
Step 2: Tasks for ZooEasy
After step 1 has been completed, you can contact the helpdesk. The helpdesk will then switch on the module and start the calculation. All animals whose mean kinship still has to be calculated have the text [Recalculate] next to this field. Once the calculation is done, the calculated percentage will be displayed. Depending on the amount of animals involved, the calculation can take several hours, days or weeks. The helpdesk will provide an estimate for this subject.
Note: Adding founders after you have started using the mean kinship module can lead to a large series of recalculations. This temporarily sets values to [Recalculate]. Depending on the size, this can take days to weeks for large populations (5,000 breeding animals). If founders need to be added after the mean kinship module is in use, please contact the helpdesk first. We can then temporarily disable the recalculation process. Once all founders have been entered, you can inform the helpdesk after which the process can be enabled again.