Dairy owners in Punjab are facing a peculiar problem. Their high-yield, cross-bred cows are so ‘alien’ to India that they are now stressed by the hot and humid conditions of this country and are displaying an alarmingly high trend of infertility.

Senior veterinarians at the Guru Angad Dev Veterinary and Animal Sciences University (GADVASU), Ludhiana, highlight that a majority of clinical cases encountered during animal welfare camps or at field practices are of infertility among cross-bred cows.

With an objective to get more milk, dairy owners have gone in for artificial insemination for their animals, using the semen of European bulls. The milk yield of the progeny is high, but their requirements are different. These cows now need cold living conditions and a high-nutrition diet, which the dairy owners are unable to provide. As a result, the cows face stress and are unable to conceive.

Dr Harish Verma, professor and head of the Department of Veterinary Extension at GADVASU, explains that the cows are impregnated with the semen of Holstein-Friesian bulls of Germany and Holland. “This way, the milk yield of the cows goes up considerably.”

The owners of dairy farms in the state admit to have gone in for hybridisation at a very high level. Avtar Singh Ratol owns about 200 cross-bred cows, housed at his dairy farm in Saroud village near Malerkotla. He says cows with up to 65 per cent “pure blood” yield 15 to 30 litres of milk daily. “These cows can stand temperatures of 28 to 30 degrees Celsius. But a number of farmers have gone in for up to 75 per cent hybridisation. Those cows give 30 to 50 litre milk daily, but must be kept in the temperatures of 20 to 22 degrees Celsius, with coolers and foggers. Their nutritional requirements are very high too. Most farmers are not able to manage this. As a result, the cows are not able to conceive,” he says.

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