Abstract
The trial was conducted on thirty buffalo cows subdivided in three groups. In the immediate pre-calving, 2.5 ml of Echinacea purpurea were orally administered to the first group (A) and, after calving, Nux vomica, Chelidonium and Lycopodium were administered at 7 days intervals. The second group (B) was only subjected to the post-calving treatment, while the third group (C) represented the control group. Immediately after calving two groups of calves were formed. The first group received 5 granules of Pyrogenium in the first days of life and then for 10 days the 0.5 ml of E. purpurea. The second group did not receive any remedy. Before the calving, in conventional farm twenty buffalo cows (D group) were vaccinated. Remedies administration did not affect milk protein content, milk lipid contents and the achievement of the lactation peak. Blood samples showed that total protein, albumin and globulin levels were lower in group A, compared to groups B and C. Cholesterol and urea were lower in the treated groups than in the control. We therefore conclude that the use of homeopathic remedies are a chance to improve animal welfare and their productive characteristics.
Highlights
In Italy, the breeding of Mediterranean buffalo (Bubalus bubalis) is an important economic and social reality, for the large number of personnel involved, for the economic and productive profits, becoming a strategic point for the economy a whole area
The attention is devoted, especially in the production process, to the reduction of drugs employed in the farm, like pesticides, antibiotics and vaccines; some farmers, rightly encouraged by the opportunity to obtain products of different nutritional and organoleptic characteristics, responding better to the new demands of the consumer, sold at a higher price, have transformed their conventional farm in an organic breeding
The last stage of pregnancy and the first few months of life of the calf represent a crucial phase in the management of buffalo farm’s because these phases are critical for transmission of immunity defences by maternal way [1] because the calf is unable to respond to major environmental agents, pathogens and non, that cause the high neonatal mortality and the high mortality in the first three months of calf life (30% to 45%, unpublished data)
Summary
In Italy, the breeding of Mediterranean buffalo (Bubalus bubalis) is an important economic and social reality, for the large number of personnel involved, for the economic and productive profits, becoming a strategic point for the economy a whole area. The last stage of pregnancy and the first few months of life of the calf represent a crucial phase in the management of buffalo farm’s because these phases are critical for transmission of immunity defences by maternal way [1] because the calf is unable to respond to major environmental agents, pathogens and non, that cause the high neonatal mortality (from 10% - 15%) and the high mortality in the first three months of calf life (30% to 45%, unpublished data) This situation drives a development of infectious diseases of high mortality, showing symptoms affecting the gastrointestinal apparatus with diarrhoeic events leading to severe dehydration that often carries the calf to death [2]. Aim of this work was to improve the knowledge of the effects of administration of Echinacea on neonatal mortality in organic and conventional buffalo livestock; it is intended to study the effects of administration of homeopathic detoxicating, immune-stimulating and production-stimulating remedies (Nux vomica, Chelidonium and Lycopodium) in the pre- and post-partum in buffalo cows
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