Animal Research International (2014) 11(1): 1851 – 1862
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EVALUATION OF FERTILITY TRAITS OF FRIESIAN X BUNAJI DAIRY COWS 1
ALPHONSUS, Cyprian, 1AKPA, Gerald Nwachi, 2BARJE, Peter Pano, 2NWAGU, Bartholomew I. and 1ORUNMUYI, Modupe 1 Department of Animal Science, Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, Nigeria. 2 National Animal Production Research, Ahmadu Bello University, Shika-Zaria, Nigeria.
Corresponding Author: Alphonsus, C. Department of Animal Science, Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, Nigeria. Email:
[email protected] Phone: +234 703 559 5978
ABSTRACT
Data from 13 primaparous and 47 multiparous Friesian-Bunaji (F1) crossbred cows were used to evaluate the reproductive performance of Friesian x Bunaji dairy cows. Four fertility traits; days to first insemination (DFI), days open (DO), Non-return rate 56 days after first insemination (NRR56) and numbers of insemination per conception (NIC) were analysed . The results revealed that the average days to first insemination (DFI), days open (DO) , number of insemination per conception (NIC), and non- return rate 56 days after first insemination (NRR56) were 122.29 days, 171.18 days, 1.64, and 61%, respectively. These traits were highly variability (CV = 54.01-80.90%). The effects of sire and sex of calf on the reproductive characteristics were not significant (p>0.05). The dam body condition score (BCS) had significant effect on all the reproductive characteristics. The DFI, DO and NIC decreased with increase in BCS. Dams with BCS of < 2.50 had longer DFI and DO, and required higher number of inseminations before conception (NIC), while those with BCS of >3.50 had shorter DFI and DO with minimum number of insemination per conception (1.00). Dam parity had no significant effect (p>0.05) on the reproductive characteristics except on NRR56 and NIC. However, the heifer had longer days to first insemination (DFI), and days open (DO) and required higher number of inseminations per conception than the older cows. Season of calving had no significant effect (p>0.05) on the reproductive characteristics except on NRR56. The cows that calved during the wet seasons (early and late dry) had higher NRR56 (69 – 71%), than those of the dry (early and late wet) seasons (40 – 59%). The reproductive performance of the cows depreciated significantly (p3.5), Pk = fixed effect of kth parity (k= 1,2….4 5+), SXl = fixed effect of lth sex of calf (l = male or female), SCm= fixed effect of mth season of calving (m= 1…4), Yn= fixed effect of nth year of calving (n= 2011, 2012, 2012) and eijklmn = random or residual error. Heritability Estimates: The variance components used for the estimation of heritability (h2) of each milk yield and fertility traits were obtained by variance component procedure (PROC VARCOMP) of SAS (2000), using restricted maximum likelihood (REML) method. The fitted random model for paternal half sib heritability estimation was as follows: Yij= µ +αi + eij; where Yij = records of milk and fertility characteristics of cows of each sire, µ = over all mean, αi = random effect of ith sire and eij = the uncorrelated environmental and genetic deviations attributed to individual cows within each sire group (Khan and Singh, 2002).
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RESULTS AND DISCUSSION Fertility Traits: The descriptive statistics of fertility traits of Freiesian x Bunaji cows indicated that the overall mean DFI in this study (122.29 ± 12.48 days) (Table 1) was higher than the 102.5 days reported by Kassab and Salem (1993) and 88.4 days reported by Hammoud et al. (2010) both on Fresian herd in Egypt. Also Paluci et al. (2007) reported DFI of 89.8 days in Canadian Holstein cows. Days open (DO) is a part of calving interval that can be shortened by improved herd management (Hammoud et al., 2010). This could also be affected by accurate heat detection. Therefore, DO is primarily a management decision, with the length of DO depending largely on the operators attitude and reproduction goals. The average DO (171.18 ± 21.78 days) obtained in this study compared favourably with the 177 days reported by Goshu et al. (2007) in Ethiopia, but lower than the 181 days reported by Yohannes and Hoddinott (2001) in commercial farm, and also the 205 days reported by Asinwe and Kifaro (2007) in Holstein Friesian (HF) dairy herd in Tanzania. However, the DO value in this study was higher than the 148 and 150 days reported by Tadesse et al. (2010) in HF commercial dairy farm in Turkey, 130.70 days reported by Hammoud et al. (2010) and 141 days reported by Shalaby et al. (2001) in Friesian herd in Egypt. Number of insemination per conception (NIC) is a widely used index of fertility. The average number of insemination per conception (NIC) reported in this study (1.64 ± 0.17) is similar to the 1.62 reported by Lobago (2007) in small holder dairy farms but higher than the range of 1.30 – 1.50 given by Radostits (2001) and Goshu et al. (2007), and the 1.30 reported by Akpa et al. (2011). However, the values obtained in this study were lower than the estimates of 2.15 reported by Yohannes and Hoddinott (2001) in Asela dairy farm, and 2.00 obtained by Ngodigha et al. (2009) in commercial dairy farms. The average NIC of 1.64 in this study was lower than the 2.3 reported by Eid et al. (2012) for imported cows and also higher than the 2.0 reported for Fresian dairy cattle in Nigeria (Ngodigha et al., 2009) and 2.11 for
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Alphonsus et al.
Table 1: Descriptive statistics of reproductive characteristics of Friesian x Bunaji dairy cows n Characteristics Days to first insemination (DFI) Days open (DO) Number of insemination per conception (NIC) Non return rate 56 days (NRR56)
Mean
Min
Max
CV
122.29± 12.48 177.18± 21.78 1.64 ± 0.17 0.61 ± 0.08
30.00 67.33 1.00 0.00
265.00 366.00 5.00 1.00
54.01 67.33 62.15 80.90
n = number of cows examined (60), Min = minimum value recorded, max = maximum value recorded, cv = coefficient of variation
Table 2: Least square the effect of sire, sex of calf and dam body condition score on reproductive parameters of Friesian x Bunaji dairy cows Factors Sire
Sex of calf Dam BCS
1 2 3 4 Male Female 3.5
N
DFI
DO
NIC
NRR56
10 28 9 13 28 32 3 46 11
161.06± 30.76a 131.11±24.48a 81.87±92.05a 63.65±39.63a 99.31 ± 32.02a 119.53 ± 31.48a 126.12±13.48c 101.50±47.66b 68.00±67.41a
234.11±48.20a 170.62±38.37a 271.93±144.27a 112.03±62.12a 205.34±50.18 a 189.01±49.35 a 174.42±23.17c 101.50±83.56b 68.00±18.17a
2.26±0.51a 1.59±0.36a 2.02±1.54a 1.61±0.62a 1.71±0.51a 2.03±0.49a 1.72±18.0c 1.06±0.72b 1.00±0.72 a
0.64±0.21 a 0.71±0.15 a 0.73±0.65 a 0.33±0.26 a 0.59±0.21 a 0.61±0.20 a 0.51±0.20a 0.78±0.21c 0.74±0.22b
Different number in a column for a factor significantly different means at p0.05) effect on the fertility traits of the cows. Although there was no literature found that confirmed or disputed the present finding, but it might be suggested that the fertility of the cows was independent of the sex of calf. The dam body condition score which reflects the body reserves and energy balance status of the cows (Kadarmideen, 2004) showed significant (p0.05) effect on the reproductive characteristics except on non return rate 56 days after the first insemination and on the number of insemination per conception (Table 3). The not significant effect of dam parity on DFI and DO in this study agreed with the findings of Yohannes and Hoddinott (2001), but contradicted the reports of Abou-Bakr et al. (2006) whom reported significant effect of parity on DFI, Asimwe and Kifaro (2007), Goshu et al. (2009) and Tadesse et al. (2010) whom reported significant influence of parity on DO and Haugana et al. (2005) that reported significant effect of parity on NRR56. Although the effect of parity on the DFI and DO in this study was not significant, there was however, a tendency for these traits to increase with parity. The heifers had longer days to first insemination (DFI), and days open (DO) and required higher number of insemination per
conception (NIC) than the cows. This trend is consistent with the findings of Berry et al. (2011) who reported a decline in average number of days from calving to first service for cows in parity 1 to 5. Also, Murray (2003) reported that fertility tend to get poorer with increase in number of lactation with a slight decrease from first to third lactation. The possible reasons for this trend could be due to differential in physiological development between the younger and older cows, in which the physiological stress of first calving could affect the resumption of ovarian activity of the young cows (heifers) thus, prolonged the intervals of days to first insemination and days open. The second plausible explanation is the fact that after the first parity, animals continues to grow whereby the dietary energy intake is partition to meet the requirement for maintenance, growth, lactation and reproduction and this might affect the energy stability of the cows required for optimum performance. A report by Stahl et al. (1999) showed that first lactation cows had lower energy balance (EB) because they eat less and have energy requirement for growth in addition for lactation, and that lower energy balance in first lactating cows is associated with delays ovulation (prolong interval to first ovulation). Also Lucy (2001) observed that negative EB causes a delay in ovulation. There was a phenotypic trend in DFI and DO from first to fifth parity in which DFI and DO decreased with parity order with differences of approximately 50 days and 68 days, respectively between 1st and 5th parity. This finding was in agreement with the findings of Van Raden et al. (2004) that DO decreased with parity order with differences of approximately 20 days between 1st and 5th lactation. Season of calving had no significant (p>0.05) effect on the fertility traits of the cows except on NRR56 and NIC. The not significant effect of season on the fertility traits confirmed the earlier findings of Kassab and Salem (1993) and Goshu et al. (2009) who reported not significant effect of season on DO and DFI, respectively.
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Evaluation of fertility traits of Friesian x Bunaji dairy cows
Table 3: Least square effect of parity, season and year of calving on reproductive parameters of Friesian x Bunaji dairy cows Factors Parity
Seasons of calving
Year of calving
1 2 3 4 5+ Early wet Late wet Early dry Late dry 2010 2011 2012
N 14 12 13 11 10 15 13 17 15 20 24 16
DFI 144.06± 59.18 a 93.58±38.55a 106.26± 38.79a 101.35±34.42a 101.88±41.31a 74.07±3.09a 101.49±36.29a 145.42±74.45a 116.71±24.39a 88.47±34.24c 108.31±42.04b 131.49±42.73a
DO 239.02±60.79a 190.71±60.41 a 211.72±92.75 a 201.42±53.95 a 143.00±64.74 a 112.69±56.57a 204.81±56.89a 312.97±116.69a 158.22±38.24a 80.39±53.67c 214.99±65.89b 269.135±66.97 a
NIC 2.73±0.75a 1.48±0.62b 1.81±0.65b 1.91±0.55b 1.41±0.68b 1.51±0.57b 1.56±0.41b 2.19±1.00a 2.21±0.64a 1.01±0.59ab 1.87±0.63ab 2.72±0.66a
NRR56 0.45±0.23bc 0.66±0.26b 0.54±0.27b 0.51±0.31b 0.84±0.29a 0.59±0.24b 0.40±0.27c 0.69±0.42a 0.71±0.17a 0.86±0.25a 0.51±0.27b 0.42±0.28c
Different number in a column for a factor significantly different means at p
