Processing characteristics of dairy cow milk are moderately heritable

Milk processing attributes represent a group of milk quality traits that are important to the dairy industry to inform product portfolio. However, because of the resources required to routinely measure such quality traits, precise genetic parameter estimates from a large population of animals are lacking for these traits. Milk processing characteristics considered in the present study—rennet coagulation time, curd-firming time, curd firmness at 30 and 60 min after rennet addition, heat coagulation time, casein micelle size, and milk pH—were all estimated using mid-infrared spectroscopy prediction equations. Variance components for these traits were estimated using 136,807 test-day records from 5 to 305 d in milk (DIM) from 9,824 cows using random regressions to model the additive genetic and within-lactation permanent environmental variances. Heritability estimates ranged from 0.18 ± 0.01 (26 DIM) to 0.38 ± 0.02 (180 DIM) for rennet coagulation time; from 0.26 ± 0.02 (5 DIM) to 0.57 ± 0.02 (174 DIM) for curd-firming time; from 0.16 ± 0.01 (30 DIM) to 0.56 ± 0.02 (271 DIM) for curd firmness at 30 min; from 0.13 ± 0.01 (30 DIM) to 0.48 ± 0.02 (271 DIM) for curd firmness at 60 min; from 0.08 ± 0.01 (17 DIM) to 0.24 ± 0.01 (180 DIM) for heat coagulation time; from 0.23 ± 0.02 (30 DIM) to 0.43 ± 0.02 (261 DIM) for casein micelle size; and from 0.20 ± 0.01 (30 DIM) to 0.36 ± 0.02 (151 DIM) for milk pH. Within-trait genetic correlations across DIM weakened as the number of days between compared intervals increased but were mostly >0.4 except between the peripheries of the lactation. Eigenvalues and associated eigenfunctions of the additive genetic covariance matrix for all traits revealed that at least the 80% of the genetic variation among animals in lactation profiles was associated with the height of the lactation profile. Curd-firming time and curd firmness at 30 min were weakly to moderately genetically correlated with milk yield (from 0.33 ± 0.05 to 0.59 ± 0.05 for curd-firming time, and from −0.62 ± 0.03 to −0.21 ± 0.06 for curd firmness at 30 min). Milk protein concentration was strongly genetically correlated with curd firmness at 30 min (0.84 ± 0.02 to 0.94 ± 0.01) but only weakly genetically correlated with milk heat coagulation time (−0.27 ± 0.07 to 0.19 ± 0.06). Results from the present study indicate the existence of exploitable genetic variation for milk processing characteristics. Because of possible indirect deterioration in milk processing characteristics due to selection for greater milk yield, emphasis on milk processing characteristics is advised.