A benchmark study on reproductive management assessment of dairy animals under rural smallholder conditions

摘要

About 200 rural smallholder dairy farmers completed a questionnaire that was designed to assess the practices adopted by them for the reproductive management of cattle and buffaloes. Repeat breeding, retention of placenta and anestrus were the commonly encountered problems in cattle and buffaloes, whereas silent estrus was an additional reproductive issue in buffaloes. Estrus detection procedures were faulty. The frequency of estrous detection was twice a day and the duration was <5 min. Moreover, 73% persons engaged in estrous detection were ‘multitasking’ during the period of estrous detection. For taking a decision regarding breeding of animal, ‘Doka’ (partial let down of milk without any stimulation about 2 days prior onset of estrus) was ranked as the most prominent estrus sign in buffaloes, whereas ‘standing to be mounted’ was ranked as the least important estrus sign in cattle. The techniques of semen tank management, handling of semen within the tank, thawing of semen and semen motility check were not carried out appropriately (p<.05). In summary, the present survey provided a benchmark of commonly used reproductive management practices in cattle and buffaloes under rural smallholder conditions. Introduction More than 70% Indian rural households own livestock and a majority of them are smallholders with less than 5 dairy animals (Birthal and Jha 2005, Misra et al 2007). The reproductive performance of smallholder dairy farms remains inefficient besides the fact that they may have a key role in the success of various dairy developmental schemes (Thammi Raju et al 2006). Moreover, in the current smallholder scenario, the holistic growth of dairy animals appears difficult, if not impossible, because of the non-availability of systematic fertility records (Caraviello et al 2006). The smallholder farmers must account for various factors affecting fertility viz., reproductive disorders, estrous detection and breeding activities (Grohn et al 2000). Once the in-depth data on management practices being used in smallholder farms is available, strategies can be chalked out for optimizing their fertility. Hence, using an extensive questionnaire based-survey, the objective of present study was to scrutinize the existing practices in rural smallholder dairy farms that could alter the reproductive performance of cattle and buffaloes. Materials and methods The present survey was conducted on rural smallholder dairy farms in Poadh region (30.79°N, 76.5°E) of Punjab, India. A total of 200 dairy farms with 1101 cattle and 864 buffaloes were visited during a 6 month period beginning September, 2008. Each farm housed 2.4±0.2 cattle and 1.7±0.0 buffaloes that can be further categorized as calves, heifers, and adults between 1st to 3rd parity and above 3rd parity. The respective average of these categories at each farm with respect to cattle and buffaloes was 2.6±0.3 and 1.8±0.1 (calves), 1.9±0.3 and 1.4±0.1 (heifers), 3.0±0.5 and 1.8±0.1 (1-3 parity), and 1.9±0.3 and 1.5±0.1 (>3 parity).A comprehensive questionnaire was designed and a personal interview was conducted at each farm. Questions were answered by head of the household or family member or labor, whosoever was mainly responsible for the animals. The main categories for which information was obtained were herd management (Table 1), reproductive disorders (Table 1), estrous detection (Table 2), breeding activities (Table 3) and artificial insemination (AI) procedures (Table 4). The frequencies were tabulated for various variables and data was analyzed. Microsoft Excel was used to input data and concatenate different combinations of response. Frequency percentage for all the categories was calculated individually. Whenever there was more than one response per informant the total exceeded 100%. Statistical significance (P<0.05) for a select categorical variable compared with other categorical variable (in response to a categorized question) was generated using chi-square (χ2) test (Dyt