Effect of dietary sorbitol supplementation on performance of crossbred dairy cattle during winter season in Jammu

Abstract

The effect of sorbitol supplementation on physiological, hemato-biochemical and milk production parameters was studied for a period of 12 weeks during winter on 12 crossbred dairy cattle, aged 4–5 years, average body weight 420–500 Kg and producing 10–15 kg of milk/day. The animals were randomly divided into two groups (T1 and T2) of six each. The T1 group served as control and T2 group was supplemented with sorbitol @100gm/animal/day. During the experiment, the minimum temperature, maximum temperature, wind velocity, Wind Chill Temperature (WCT) and Relative Humidity (RH) ranged from 8.00±0.44 to 15.29±0.42°C; 20.43±0.87 to 25.00±0.49°C, 2.42±0.37 to 4.48±0.77 km/hr, 5.67±0.51 to 13.68±0.62°C and 79.14±2.40 to 88.43±1.78%, respectively. Dietary supplementation of sorbitol significantly (P<0.05) increased the rectal temperature (°C) of T2 (36.12±0.04, 38.03±0.11) over T1 (35.86±0.04, 37.73±0.12) both at 6: 00 hrs and 14: 00 hrs. Glucose level (mg/dl) was significantly (P<0.05) higher in T2 (69.60±0.38) than T1 (68.07±0.20). Significantly (P<0.05) higher milk yield (Kg) was recorded in T2 (9.60±0.28) than T1 (8.31±0.27). The respiration rate, pulse rate, hemoglobin (Hb), packed cell volume (PCV), erythrocyte sedimentation rate (ESR), aspartate aminotransferase (AST), alanine aminotransferase (ALT), glutathione peroxidase (GPx) and superoxide dismutase (SOD), dry matter intake (DMI), water intake (WI), rumination number (R. No) did not differ significantly between T1 and T2. Thus it is concluded that, dietary supplementation of sorbitol to crossbred dairy cattle during winter has beneficial effect on increasing the rectal temperature, blood glucose level and milk production.