Knowledge Level of Scientific Dairy Farming Practices among Peri-Urban Dairy Farmers in Thanjavur District of Tamil Nadu

摘要

The present study was conducted in peri-urban areas of Thanjavur city in Tamil Nadu to identify the knowledge level of dairy farmers. A total of 120 respondents was selected randomly from 10 peri-urban villages located in and around 10 km radius of the urban areas in Thanjavur. The results of the study revealed that more than one-half of the dairy farmers possessed medium (55.00 %) knowledge level in all aspects of improved dairy management practices, followed by low (27.50 %) and high (17.50 %). Most of the farmers had complete knowledge with respect to feeding additional concentrates to pregnant animals and correct time of feeding colostrum to new born calves. Regarding scientific breeding practices, 43.33 percentage of farmers had complete knowledge on cross breeds of cows / buffalo, symptoms of heat (75.00 %), performing artificial insemination (AI) at right time (70.83 %), selection of good milch breed (65.00 %) and pregnancy diagnosis (69.17 %). Based on findings it is better to disseminate area specific scientific interventions and skill oriented capacity building programmes in improved dairy management practices would be helpful to develop a commercial and profitable dairy enterprise in peri-urban areas.