Production System And Phenotypic Characterization Of Begait Cattle And Effects Of Supplementation With Concentrate Feeds On Milk Yield And Composition Of Begait Cows In Humera Ranch Western Tigray Ethiopia

The study was carried out in Kafta Humera Woreda of Tigray National Regional State with the objectives of Production System and Phenotypic Characterization of Begait Cattle, and Effects of Supplementation with Concentrate feeds on Milk Yield and Composition of Begait Cows. To collect the quantitative and qualitative data, questionnaire, group discussions, field observation, and morphometric measurements were employed. A total of 104 households owning Begait cattle were individually interviewed. The phenotypic body descriptors were directly measured using measuring tape, and morphological measurements including tail length, ear length, horn length, dewlap width; naval flap length, perpetual length, teat length, heart girth, height at withers, body length, and neck length were collected on 192 Begait cattle. The feeding trial was conducted in Humera Begait cattle breeding and multiplication ranch. Four lactating cows in second parity and in early stage of lactation (70 days after calving) were used in 4*4 Latin square design to receive four treatment diets. The Average body weight and initial milk yield of cows was 322 ± 11kg and 2.2±0.14 kg/cow/day, respectively. The treatments included: basal diet + wheat bran (T1), basal diet + wheat bran + noug seed cake (T2), basal diet +wheat bran + cotton seed cake (T3), and basal diet+ wheat bran + 50%(noug and cotton seed cake) (T4), where sorghum Stover was the basal diet and given adi libitum to all the treatments. The treatment rations were isonitrogenous. The survey result indicated that, mixed crop-livestock production system was the dominant farming system. The major livestock feed resources were natural pasture and natural pasture (standing hay) in wet and dry season respectively. Trypanosomiasis and Pasteurellosis were the major reported cattle diseases according to ranking index value. Lack of feed,rnxvirndiseases and water scarcity were the major factors hampering cattle production. Farmers perceived that Begait cattle population decreased over the years mainly due to feed shortage, diseases and water scarcity. The mean linear measurements of female Begait cattle were: height at wither (131. 48±0.25cm), body length (128.13±0.16cm) heart girth (159.55±0.24). The naval flap and teats average mean values were 12.14±0.07cm and 10.47±0.03 cm, respectively. In male Begait cattle the values were: height at wither (137.10±0.10 cm), body length (136.0±0.09 cm), and heart girth (168.91±0.10cm). The study revealed the following results, age at first puberty (female) (35.51± 0.14 months), age at first calving (48.68±0.16 months), calving interval (17.06±0.11 months) and productive life time (8.2±0.07 years); daily milk yield (2.52±0.30 liter) and lactation length (6.38±0.28 months). In general, the production and reproduction performance of Begait cattle was relatively higher, even than other local breeds in the region specifically in terms of milk yield and fertility potential. Despite their high productive and reproductive performance, the current performance and population size was found to be interwoven by many constraints. Results related to the feeding trial showed that, a treatment supplemented with a mixture of wheat bran and noug seed cake(T2), wheat bran with cotton seed cake (T3), and wheat bran with noug and cotton seed cakes (T4) had significantly higher (P

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