Abstract
Housing and socialization have always played a pivotal role on overall health and welfare of the young calves. Therefore, the study was undertaken to compare the performance of the calves when kept indoors in enclosures (Treatment, T) versus semi covered houses with provision of open space (Control, C), respectively. Calves in semi covered houses (C) was found to display profound results on faecal score (P<0.01) and body weight (P<0.05). Besides, the housing temperature in the treatment sheds was significantly higher (P<0.01) during the mornings in monsoon season although humidity was reportedly higher at all seasons; monsoon (P<0.01), post monsoon (P<0.05) and winters (P<0.01), respectively. The greatest THI were recorded in the month of July (76.72) in Control group (C) and August (79.67) in Treatment group. Besides with the highest THI (74.50±0.81, P<0.01) with elevated rectal temperatures (101.22±0.15 °F, P<0.05) was recorded in the treatment (T) calves. However, a positive significant correlation of rectal temperature with THI (r=0.434; P<0.01) and respiratory rate (r=0.339; P<0.01) wasobserved in the experimental calves. The calves in C group had fewer incidences of respiratory illness and problems of diarrhoea when compared to the T calves. Therefore, maintaining fewer calves in semi covered houses with provision of open space was found to be beneficial on health, growth and housing environment of the calves.
Highlights
Housing and environment plays a vital role in the maintaining health, growth and well-being of the calves during the first few weeks of life when it’s coping mechanism is still in its infancy
The calves in the T group suffered from bloody diarrhoea, loose stool/scour, respiratory illness, pneumonia during the monsoon and post monsoon period (July, August, September and October); the calves in the C group suffered from bloody diarrhoea and scour prominently in the monsoon period (July and August)
Most of the studies conducted found that the mortality rate of the calves was higher in larger groups of more than e” 7 (Losigner and Heinrichs, 1997) and lower for small groups and individual calves (Svensson et al 2005)but here in this study, the calves in both the treatment and control group was in smaller numbers
Summary
Housing and environment plays a vital role in the maintaining health, growth and well-being of the calves during the first few weeks of life when it’s coping mechanism is still in its infancy. Temperature humidity index (THI) is the most common yardstick determining environmental stress on lactating dairy cows (Bohmanova et al, 2007) and conception rate in cattle (Rawat et al, 2014) or sperm quality in bulls (Bernabucci et al, 2014) but little has been understood in crossbred calves of the tropical countries. Many animal friendly houses have been introduced to protect the calves from extremes of weather conditions. Physiological indices such as respiratory rate, rectal temperature, skin temperature and heart rate were higher in 7 week Holstein calves when maintained in an unshaded thermal environment (Kovacs et al, 2018) while hutches with reflective polythene covers experienced better temperatures (Manriquez et al, 2017). The objective of the study was to find a suitable housing system of the calves in the lower Gangetic plains of West Bengal and to evaluate the performances during monsoon, post monsoon and winter season
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