Variability in size and shape in muscovy duck with age: principal component analysis.

Body weight and six linear body measurements, body length (BL), breast circumference (BCC), thigh length (TL), shank length (SL), total leg length (TLL) and wing length were recorded on 150 male and female muscovy ducklings and evaluated at 3, 5, 10, 15 and 20 weeks of age. Principal component analysis was used to study the dependence structure among the body measurements and to quantify sex differences in morphometric size and shape variations during growth. The first principal components at each of the five ages in both sexes accounted between 71.54 to 92.95% of the variation in the seven measurements and provided a linear function of size with nearly equal emphasis on all traits. The second principal components in all cases also accounted for between 6.7 to 16.17% of the variations in the dependence structure of the system in the variables as shape, the coefficient for the PCs at various ages were sex dependent with males showing higher variability because of spontaneous increase in size and shape than females. Contribution of the general size factor to the total variance increase with age in both male and female ducklings, while shape factor tend to be stable in males and inconsistent in females.