GOOD MANAGEMENT PRACTICE OF DAIRY FARMING IN INDIA
Dairy farming is the primary component of animal husbandry. Milk is the commodity having highest demand in the market after Petrol. Total income from milk is more than the total income of sugarcane and paddy. After operation flood India is the leading milk producer in entire world. But compared to other countries our individual milk production average is less. So we are less producing milk from more animals but due to population is high, our production is also goes high. So we need to change our strategy that we should improve the milk production from our animals. Already we are pioneer in artificial insemination, cross breeding, upgrading of our cattle. Genetically we are modifying our animals but it will not sufficient for the increase in production. We need to provide ideal environment including the feed and water for optimum production. In field condition farmers are more concern about income but they fail to provide good input for dairy farming. Some of the management aspects given below for the improvement of dairy farming.
Selection of animal
Before selection make sure that your purpose of animal. If your need for good quality of milk for hotels and milk production unit better go for Buffalo farming. If you have milk society in the village or near to dairy farm and plan to rear female calves than go for cross breed dairy farming. If you are interested in male calves rearing which have good demand in draft work go for indigenous breed animal rearing. Ideal characters of cow for dairy farming are cow should be pregnant above 8 months, udder should be pendulous, symmetric, should have a thick mammary vein, should have a round body, glistening hair coat, all teats will be having milk, no deformities on the body, oral cavity should have teeth, no abnormal discharges from eye, nose and from vagina. Animal should not have diarrhoea, bloat, fever and lameness. Animal should be free from external parasites. If animals already calving means it should have healthy calf. Old aged, poor body score animals should not be purchased. Before purchasing animal should be carefully examined from veterinarian including pregnancy status. After purchase animal should be transported to shed in evening or morning hours. Stress should be avoided to animals especially from the rough driving and road humps. After transport electrolyte water and green fodder should be given to the animal for early recovery from transport stress.
Housing
Housing is required for optimum growth in productivity of the animals. The animals should be protected from the extreme climatic conditions like too hot, too moist and wet condition. They should be provided with optimum temperature and humidity for better productivity. Animal shed required space 5.5feet×10 feet for adult cow/ buffalo as the floor space. The floor is made up of concrete and 1.5 percent slope towards the drainage. The drainage open with width 8 inch and 3inch depth with slightly slope for easily cleaning. The ceiling height should be 10 feet with normal local material availabilities. The manger should be 2 feet wide and 1.5 feet deep and 1 feet above the floor and water space provide by the side of the manger. Floor should not be slippery and cow mats are used for better comfort to animals. During summer the ceiling should be painted with white colour and fans provided to reduce the heat in the shed. The sprinkling of water for 15-20 minutes reduce the heat stress in summer. Water foggers should be running during peak afternoon or sunny hours. Farm should be surrounded by fodder trees, which keeps environment cool and gives green fodder in summer. Floor mats should be cleaned regularly to maintain cleanliness and hygiene in the farm to avoid the problems like foot rot and mastitis. During winter the side walls should be closed with gunny bags.
Fodder management
Fodder is the key input in dairy farming. Dairy farm should have its own fodder cultivation unit. Dairy farming with purchased fodder will not be feasible. Dairy animals needs very good nutritional status for optimum production. Concentrates should be given @ 350gms per litres of milk production, 10-12 kg dry fodder and adlibidum green fodder should be given for optimum production. Maize, Sorghum, Bajra, Hybrid Napier grass, Guinea grass, and Para grass should be cultivated in the farm. The fodder must be chaffed and given to animals for better health and optimum production. Azolla, hydrophonics and fodder trees should be cultivated in the farm to avoid the scarcity of green fodder in summer and lean season. Regular mineral mixtures should be fed to animals to avoid the deficiency of minerals to animals. Bypass protein and carbohydrate feed supplementation should be given to high yielders for the high yielding animals, low quality feed and sudden change in feed should be avoided. Adlibitum of clean potable water should available to animals whole day.
Breeding management
Cross breed cattle are more prone for the reproductive problems. Animal should be managed carefully during the prepural period. Dystocia, retention of placenta, uterine evulsion and torsion will leads to more veterinary attention and fall in production. Cow should be return to heat within 3 months of parturition, if not means immediate veterinarian attention should be given. For ideal reproduction and optimum production calf per year should be followed in the farm that is 305 days of lactation and 60 days of dry period. If any animal showing any reproductive problems like anoestrus, repeat breeding, pre or post partum prolapsed, pyometra should be treated early with specialist veterinarian. If animal not conceived within 3 months of calving than calving interval will becomes long and production will be falls and reproductive efficiency will goes down and ultimately dairy farming will end up with low production and income.
Record keeping
All animals data should be entered in both note book and computer. Data starting from purchase of animal, date of parturition, calf details, milk yield, disease related data, vaccination, deworming, insemination and pregnancy diagnosis, feeding data should be recorded of each animal. It will be helpful in the improvement in the production in the farm, culling of animals and helps in dealing with so many issues related to dairy farming including the future plan of extension and planning for feeds and fodder. Even data on calves, milk sale, and manure sale should be recorded.
Labour management
Labour management is the key of success in dairy farming. If your labours are good means yours dairy will be in profit by 50%. Dairy farm labours should be skilled, they should have affection on animals, they should take care of animals with good feeding, watering, washing of animals, feeding of milk to calves and cleaning of dairy farm. A small family like husband and wife can take care of 10 animals dairy. If number of animals more means more labour are required. Most of the time labours are the reason for the failure of dairy farming due to poor working in the farm and negligence in the daily routine in the farm including the animal health care. Labours should be monitored with good wages and encouraging manager of the farm. They should be trained in the working dairy farms about 1-2 months before working in new dairy farm as a practical experience. Labours should be monitored regularly and auto mechanisation like milking machines, automatic waterer and feeder should be introduced in the farm. CCTV camera should be fitted in the farm for the safety and security reasons. Farm should be theft proof and should have a security in night hours. If labours are absent on a day due to any reason owner of the farm should be ready for feeding and milking of animals.
Dairy farm economics
Main aim of any farming activity is to earn the money. In India dairy farming is not economical event as per the some of previously dairy farming practiced persons. So before staring the farm one should think of market of milk, animals and manure. If milk is alone source for the income means definitely it is difficult to manage the farm. Labour payment, feed cost, cost of animal, medication cost and other miscellaneous expenditures are more in dairy farming. If cost of production is more and cost of milk sale is less means it’s very difficult to maintain the farms economy. If milk has low price and less demand means go for milk products like Khova, butter, ghee, panner production. All these commodities are having high demand in market. Manure in used in the form of wormy compost. The calves, pregnant and culled animals should also be the source of income. Cost of production should be minimized so that farmers should have more margins in the farming.
Care and management of the pregnant animals in dairy farm
After 3 months of artificial insemination cow should be examined for the pregnancy. If the animal is pregnant means it should be given more care in terms of feeding and optimum environment in the farm. During this period animal is in peak stage of production. Here animal needs nutrients for its body maintenance, production of milk and for the growth of the foetus. Any poor management or poor nutrition status leads to fall in production, abortions will causes severe economical losses in terms of production and reproduction. So in dairy farming, the pregnant animals care is the most important part. The separate shed for pregnant animals should be constructed. The animals should not under goes stressful condition such as grazing, even uneven path and sudden running during rainy or thunders condition. The animals above 6-7 month of pregnancy, changes in feed supplement gradually because of rapid growth of the foetus inside the animals. Provide the clean feed and water to the animals, minimum 75-80 litres of clean and fresh water provide to the pregnant animals. While grazing also, do not combine with the male animals and heifers, sometimes they fighting each other. The shed of the pregnant cows/ buffaloes are spacious for sitting, standing and it should be clean. Feed and fodder gradually changes and provide the fodder such as green fodder 15-20 kg/ day, dry fodder 4-5kg/ day, concentrate mixture 2-3 kg/day, oil cakes 1kg, mineral mixture 50gms and salt 30gms/day.4-5 days before calving, animals should be separated and provide the shed with clean and paddy straw bedding with sunlight. Care should be taken for emergency veterinary care for the conditions like dystocia, vaginal prolapse, torsion of uterus, retention of placenta and other related problems.
Veterinary health care in dairy farm
For the optimum production and reproduction animal should be healthy and free from diseases. Deworming should be done twice a year at the gap of 6 months. External parasites like ticks, fleas, flies should not be present in the farm or on the animal. Animals should be periodically checked for the health status and subclinical infections. Vaccination should be done as per the chart from veterinarian. Teat dips should be used after milking to avoid the mastitis. Animals should be screened for sub acute ruminal acidosis, subclinical ketosis and subclinical mastitis and should be treated for the cause to avoid the animals getting same conditions in clinical farm. Diseases like Tuberculosis, Brucellosis screening should be done periodically and positive animals should be isolated and culled immediately to avoid the transmission to healthy animals. Clean milk production practices should be encouraged in the farm.
Care and Management of young calves
Calving pen should be clean and hygienic. After the birth, immediately calf should be cleaned with dry cloth, the mucus is removed from the nostrils, the hooves should be cleaned and allow to stand and the colostrum should be feed with in the hour. The calves should feed 4 litre of colostrum within 6 hour. After birth of calf, the umbilical cord cut at the 5 cm below from the umbilicus and application of iodine to avoid naval born infections. After feeding of colostrum calf should be placed to calf shed. Deworming, disbudding, vaccination, weaning and supplementation feeding should be done for the optimum growth. For the successful dairy farming calves are the bonus in terms of future animals and money. Care for the control of external parasites should be done to avoid severe infestation leading to anaemia, poor growth, body weight and sudden deaths.
Care and Management of lactating animals
After giving birth to calves, the cow requires more nutritional care. The lactating animals should have sufficient fodder and feeds. Full hand milking should be done. If animals are more than 10 it is better to go for milking machine. Milking machine should be cleaned before and after milking. Frequent changing of milking persons should be avoided. Change in diet, health status, heat, poor management, change in environment, death of calf, change in care takers and milking persons will leads to sudden fall in milk yield. So there should not be any stress to milking animals. Challenge feeding should be done to access the milk production capacity of the cow and feeding should be done as per the nutritional requirement. Feeding more to low producers and feeding less to high producers will leads to nutritional imbalance and it will affects the health status of cows and will leads to loss in the dairy farm.
Importance of lactometer reading for quality of milk for co-operative societies
Minimum standard requirement for the purchase of milk from farmers to dairy co-operatives. The milk should have 8.5 SNF and 3.5 Fat. Buffaloes and indigenous cow milk is having very good quality and they have SNF above 10 and Fat above 5. But their production is low compared to crossbred cattle. But cross bred cattle especially HF cross animals will produce more milk but quality of milk is poor it means they will have SNF below 8.5 and Fat below 3.5. If farmers pouring same quality milk means he will get very low price on the other hand cost of production of milk raising day by day. This is also a one of the limiting factor for farmers in India. So farmer should manage cross bred cattle on good plane of nutrition, by pass feed, oil cakes and mineral mixtures along with normal feeding practices. So farmer should be made aware about this quality and milk price.https://www.pashudhanpraharee.com/gmps-to-increase-gdpgood-management-practices-for-successful-dairy-farming-in-india/
Buffalo management
Buffaloes are good quality milk producers. Farming nearby town will be more beneficial. Hotels and household customers will have more demand for buffalo milk. Cost of production is more in buffaloes compared to cows. So good price for milk is needed to get the good returns. Buffaloes needs more feed compared to cow. Silent heat is the major challenging task in breeding. Artificial insemination also not that much satisfactory in Buffaloes compared to cow. So natural service in heat will be better option in buffaloes. Buffaloes are more prone to heat stress. So foggers and swimming ponds should be made to minimize the heat stress. Buffalo are more prone for HS disease outbreaks. So prior to monsoon vaccination against the HS disease should be given. Lice infestation is very common to buffaloes causes anaemia. So periodical external parasitic infestation medication, deworming should be given and regular mineral mixture feeding will enhance the production and reproduction in buffaloes.
Indigenous cow management
Breeds like Deoni, Hallikar, Amrutmahal, Krishna Valley, Khillari cows are poor milk yielders. But in agriculture their male animals have very high demand from farmers and they are good draft animals. So rearing of indigenous cattle for the male calves is also an income generating activity, wherever there is no milk market, milk co-operative societies are not there and where there is demand to male draft animals, this type of farming is profitable. Compared to cross bred cattle less feed and less management is needed for indigenous cattle and also they are more disease resistant and easily adapt to our Indian climatic condition. Periodical health check up and vaccination is must for the health care.
General line of management for successful Dairy farming in India
- Control of external and internal parasites in the farm leads to less health related issues in animals including anaemia and diarrhoea.
- Identification of subclinical diseases like subclinical mastitis, subclinical ketosis and subclinical ruminal acidosis should be diagnosed and treated early so that production will not be affected.
- In dairy farming calf are like bonus, so calf should be reared carefully and they also should be source of income.
- Keeping cattle shed clean and hygienic will avoids the diseases like mastitis, foot rot etc.
- Using foggers will helps to reduce heat stress in summer and will keep the milk yield same, so seasonal management will be practiced for optimum production.
- Dung and urine disposal should be made hygienically and they can be covert into manure, compost manure and as a slurry of bio-gas unit. It will be an additional source of income.
- Every year 3-5% aged, diseased, poor producer and repeat breeder animals should be culled to maintain the optimum production level in the farm.
- All animals in the dairy farm are should be insured to minimize the risk arising from death of animal due to various aetiology including natural calamities like lightning stroke and cyclones attack.
- All animals in the farm should be vaccinated as per the schedule weather disease outbreak is there or not. Animals should be protected from deadly diseases like HS, BQ, FMD etc.
- Follow strict bio-security measures in the farm. Outside animals, farmers and farm workers should not be allowed in the farm. Foot baths and safety cloths should be provided for visitors.
- Contaminated AI equipment, injections and other farm equipment should be discarded.
- Feed and fodder storage should have separate store room and it should be free from rodents, moisture and dampness. Feed should not have any fungal growth on it.
- Water should be of good quality and quantity should be available round the clock in the farm.
- All animals in the farm should be tagged and have an identity including calves. Based on identity record keeping should be done and that should contain all information about animal.
- Regular white washing of shed, water tank should be done to keep farm free from pests.
- Production of clean milk practices should be followed in the farm.
In India as population growing demand for milk and milk products raising every day. Dairy farming is the one of the best farming activity. Milk demand never goes down. Farmers should start from small scale and they can extend it in large scale based on market of products. In dairy farming should be profitable event for the livelihood. It also should acts as recreation centre, employment generation activity and indigenous animal breed conservation unit.
http://www.milkproduction.com/Library/Editorial-articles/Guide-to-good-dairy-farming-practice/
Acknowledgment:
Special gratitude to Dr. Annarao Patil working as Senior Veterinary officer, Dept. Of Animal husbandry and Veterinary services under Govt. Of Karnataka, for the support and encouragement of this article.
Dr Trupti Suryakant Kattimani, Veterinary officer, Veterinary dispensary Salagar Basantpur TQ: chincholi, Dist:kalaburgi, State: Karnataka
References
- How to increase the income of livestock farmer in India?. Dr Annarao Patil. 2020. Pashudhan prahari website
- How to increase the income of livestock farmer in India?. Dr Trupti Suryakant Kattimani. 2020. Pashudhan prahari website
- Website
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- Deoni cattle breed and its success stories associated with farmers. Dr Annarao Patil. 2020. Epashupalana.in website
- Role of Veterinarian activities for enhance the economy of livestock farmer in rural areas. Dr Trupti Suryakant Kattimani. 2021. Epashupalana.in website
