Abstract:
Dairy cattle genetic improvement has been practiced so far in Ethiopia to improve the
productive and reproductive performance of dairy cows. However, the achievement has
been limited due to poor husbandry practice, shortage of feed, inappropriate breeding
scheme, inefficient AI service, and mismatch between management and genetic
intervention under smallholder farmers conditions. This study was aimed to investigate
the synergetic effect of genetic and non-genetic factors on reproductive and milk
production performance of crossbred dairy cows under smallholder dairy farmer’s
condition in selected milk shed areas of Ethiopia. A total of 72 smallholder dairy
farmers who had at least two crossbred dairy cows and recruited, and non-recruited
by different projects were purposively selected from three administrative regions of
Ethiopia (Amhara, Oromia and South Nation, Nationalities, and Peoples). During the
intervention period, this study had two phases. In first phase, the selected smallholder
dairy farmers were assigned in to three treatment groups (T
1
(control), T
2
(previously
trained by the projects) and T
3
(received additional enhanced training and improved
feed input). In second phase, treatment groups that were regarded as control (T
1
)
during the first phase had received enhanced training and improved feed input
following the same protocols with previous one. On the other hand, treatment groups
that were received enhanced training and improved feed input (T
3
) considered as
control treatment group for the second phase intervention study. Tail hair samples for
genetic profiling of breed composition were collected from all experimental cows in the
study. According to their Holstein Frisian blood level, crossbred cows were classified
into four genetic groups (<25%, 25-50%, 51-75% and >75%). In addition,
experimental cows were also grouped based on their parity. Performance data
collection was collected over for the period of three years starting from 2020 to 2022.
A general linear model procedure of the statistical analysis system (SAS version, 9.0)
was used to analyse the reproductive and productive performance data. The analysis
of variance showed that statistically non-significant(P>0.05) difference was observed
for the effect of genotype by treatment and genotype by parity interactions on age at
first service (AFS), age at first calving (AFC), calving interval (CI), days open and
number of services per conception (NSPC) traits and some milk production traits such
as lactation length (LL) and first lactation length (FLL). The results of fixed effect
analysis revealed that the influence of genotype had a significant effect in age at first
service (P<0.0001), age at first calving (<0.0001), calving interval (<0.01) and
number of services per conception (<0.001) traits. However, a statistically nonsignificant
(p>0.05)
difference
was
observed
for
the
main
effect
of
treatments
on
age
at
first
service
(AFS),
age
at
first
calving
(AFC),
calving
interval
(CI),
and
number
of
services
per conception (NSPC) traits. The study also revealed that calving interval
(p<0.01) and days open (p<0.05) traits were significantly influenced by the interaction
effect of treatment and parity interaction. The analysis of variance showed that the
interaction effect of genotypes by treatments and genotype by parity caused significant
(p<0.0001) in lactation milk yield and daily milk yield traits. In addition, first lactation
milk yield (p<0.001) and first lactation daily milk yield (p<0.01) traits were
significantly influenced by the interaction effect of genotypes and treatments. Lactation
length was significantly influenced by the main effect of genotype (p<0.0001) and
treatment (p<0.001). A statistically significant effect of genotypes (p≤ 0.01) and
treatments (p≤0.001) were observed on first lactation milking days trait. The overall
least square mean value of first lactation milk yield, first lactation daily milk yield and
first lactation length for the interaction effect of genotype and treatments were 2297.0
±53.42 liters, 7.3 ± 0.15 liters and 309.0±2.00 days, respectively. The overall least
square mean value of daily milk yield, lactation length and lactation milk yield for the
interaction effect of genotype by treatment and genotype by parity were 8.0±0.16 liters,
298.2±2.51 days and 2419.8 ± 61.56 liters, respectively. In conclusion, the combined
effect of genetic and non-genetic intervention under smallholder farmers condition
resulted in increased milk production performance of primiparous and multiparous
crossbred dairy cows. However, no significant difference was observed in reproductive
performance of crossbred for synergetic effect of those factors.