R. ARIVANANTHAM
The district livestock farm produced 53 calves in 2012-13
The Hosur District Livestock Farm (DLF) has produced 53 calves using the embryo transfer technology in association with the Tamil Nadu Veterinary and Animal Sciences University and Tamil Nadu Cooperative Milk Producers’ Federation between May 2012 and December 2013, said D. Saravanan, Head of the Embryo Transfer Laboratory, on Wednesday.
Dr. Saravanan told The Hindu that the technology offers better utilisation of superior germplasm of the female donor cow to produce maximum number of high yielding offspring in short period of time than the artificial insemination followed over the last five decades.
An embryo donor is made to superovulate and bred through the semen of a superior bull. Embryos that are seven to eight days old are collected from the donor cow by non-surgical method and are transferred to the recipient cows, which will develop the foetus. Excess embryos can be stored in frozen state for any number of years for future use. Embryos can also be sexed before being transferred to the recipients.
The DLF along with other agencies and university started embryo production through six Red Sindhi cows from DLF and 50 superior Jersey cross-bred cows from eight districts such as Krishnagiri, Dharmapuri, Namakkal, Salem, Vellore, Tiruvannamalai, Madurai and Coimbatore.
Cross-bred, poor milk yielding healthy cows were selected as recipients to carry embryos of the donor cows till parturition. Before the embryos were donated to the cows, they were screened for infectious diseases such as tuberculosis, brucellosis and Johne’s disease. So far, 271 embryos have been collected from 56 cows. These embryos were transferred to 257 recipient cows. Sixty-seven cows became pregnant and 53 calves (28 bull and 25 heifer calves) were born through embryo transfer technology. In Salem, two embryos were transferred to a cow and it delivered twin calves. In Namakkal and Tiruvannamalai, five calves were born through the embryo transfer technology.
The farmers receive incentives according to the number of embryos collected from their cows. The owners of donor cows were given an incentive of Rs.5000 per flushing, and Rs.1000 for every additional good quality embryo collected. A maximum of Rs.21,000 was given as incentive to a farmer in Salem, whose cow gave 21 good quality embryos. A total of Rs.3.65 lakh was given to 53 farmers, who gave their cows for embryo collection. Owners of the donor cows were given 90 kg of concentrated feed free of cost. The owners of recipient cows were given 30 kg of concentrated feed and an embryo from a superior germplasm free of cost. If the cow becomes pregnant, an additional 250 kg of concentrated feed was given to the owner of the recipient cow during the last trimester of pregnancy. If the cow delivers a bull calf, the animal husbandry department will purchase it from the farmer for Rs.5000 within 15 days after its birth. If a heifer (female) calf is born, the farmer can retain it .The animal husbandry department has purchased 22 bull calves from the farmers.
For the conservation and propagation of Red Sindhi breed of cattle, which is an indigenous milch breed in the list of threatened Indian breeds, embryos of pure Red Sindhi cows and bulls were collected and transferred to cross-bred cows at District Livestock Farm, Hosur. Fifteen recipient cows are pregnant now, which are due for calving in the month of September 2014. Embryos of Red Sindhi cows were also kept under frozen state for future transfer.
During the phase-I of the Embryo Transfer Technology, the DLF was funded to the tune of Rs. 50 lakh by the National Project for Cattle and Buffalo Breeding (NPCBB) through the Tamil Nadu Livestock Development Agency
In Phase - II of the Embryo Transfer programme, animal husbandry department plans to conduct embryo flushings in 200 donor cows at four of its livestock farms and in 10 districts of Tamil Nadu with an aim to produce at least 300 calves and the NPCBB has sanctioned a fund of Rs. 2.5-crore for the project, Dr. Saravanan adds.
