Relationship between Body Weight and Body Dimensions in Adult Domestic Cavy, using Principal Component Analysis

Body weight and eleven (11) morpho-structural traits of 300 adult cavies sampled from three States of Northern Nigeria were used to study relationship between body weight and body dimensions in adult domestic cavy. Data collected on bodyweight and body dimension was subjected to least squares analysis and principal components analysis procedure. Results obtained showed a mean body weight of 495.00±7.35g for adult cavies. The mean values of the body dimensions ranged from 2.57±0.02cm for femur radius (FR) to 27.17±0.16cm for body length (BL). Two principal components which accounted for 64.47% of the total variance in body dimensions were extracted. The first principal component (PC1) loaded heavily on Belly girth (BG), neck circumference (NC), Heart girth (HG), Body length (BL), Shoulder length (SL), Head length (HL), and Trunk length (TL) and explained 49.25% of the total variance. The second principal component (PC2) accounted for 15.214% of the generalized variance and loaded on Hind leg length (HLL), fore leg length (FLL) and Hip to kneel length (HKL). The Orthogonal body shape characters derived from the factor analysis accounted for 52.5% of the variation in body weight of the adult cavies. It was concluded that linear body measurements would be effectively used to predict live body weights of the adult cavies.