On Farm and On Station Fertility Status of Dairy Herds in West Shoa Zone, Ethiopia
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Date
2021
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Addis Ababa University
Abstract
The on-station part of the current study was conducted at Holeta research center dairy farm to determine fertility and productive traits of dairy cattle. The dataset between 1976 and 2019 on fertility and productive traits (n=30975) were investigated and analyzed using the GLM analysis procedure of SAS 2008 software to determine the fixed effects of genetic group, year, season and parity. The fixed effect genetic group and year cause significant (P<0.0001) difference in all fertility and lactation performance. Similarly, the parity of cows had a highly(p<0.0001) influence on fertility and productive traits except NSC. The productive traits like daily milk yield, lactation length and lactation milk yield were sensitive to seasonal variation. The overall least squares mean for age at first service, age at first calving, calving interval, days open, number of services per conception were 29.98 ± 10.23 months, 39.16 ± 8.58 months, 496.24 ± 42.19 days, 216.81 ± 41.72 days, 1.85 ± 1.37and daily milk yield, lactation length and lactation milk yield 4.86 ± 1.63 liters, 287.77 ± 92.81 days and 1488.23 ± 70.14 liters.
The on-farm part of this study was conducted in three districts of West Shoa Zone of Oromia regional state initiated to assess fertility status of dairy herds and possible cause of infertility in dairy cattle. Data were collected using semi structured questionnaire survey. A total of 180 dairy producers (60 household from each) were randomly selected for individual interviews using a semi-structured questionnaire. The data were analyzed using Statistical Packages for the Social Sciences software version 26. The survey results showed that higher education was the highest educational level from Ambo woreda, and the age group of the respondents ranged from 20 to 79 years. The primary feeding system practiced was combination feeding with 53.3%, 56.7% and 45%, respectively, in Walmera, Adea Berga and Ambo. The main breeding system dairy producers utilized was both Artificial insemination and natural mating (70%, 60% and 46.7%), respectively, in Walmera, Adea Berga and Ambo. The mean shortest age at first service and age at first calving for local and crossbred, respectively, were 47.9 ± 9.8 and 19.9 ± 5.8 months and 56.9 ± 9.8 and 28.9 ± 5.8 months from Adea Berga and Ambo. The number of services per conception was 2.5 for local cows and 1.8 for crossbred cows. The higher mean (±SD) of daily milk yields were 2.2 ± 1.3 and 11.2 ± 4.5 liters, respectively, in Adea Berga for Local and crossbred cows. The mean (±SD) shortest calving intervals was 20.3 ± 7.0 and 13.1 ± 1.9 for local and crossbred cows.
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Keywords
Breed, Dairy, Fertility status, On farm, On station