Genetic Diversity in a Sample of Timor Ponies

Timor ponies (TP) were first shipped to Australia in the early 1800s and were highly valued as transport and pack animals, which resulted in TPs contributing to the development of Australian horse breeds. Today, while the exact number of TPs in Australia is currently unknown, there has been recent interest in establishing a domestic breeding program for Australian TPs.The aim of this study was to evaluate the relatedness of a sample of TPs, as well as provide estimates of genomic inbreeding levels to better inform the feasibility of using these animals as founders for a domestic breeding program. Additionally, the genetic distances between the sampled TPs and other Australian and Indonesian horse breeds were estimated.The results illustrate that there are distantly related and minimally inbred horses within the sampled TPs. Lengths of the ROH segments also indicated that recent inbreeding events are likely to only have occurred in a third of the horses. Overall, these results are promising for the success of a domestic TP breeding program; however, considering the low number of domestic TPs in Australia, there would certainly be substantial benefits to incorporating additional TPs.