Effect of Management and Topography on the Reproductive Performance of Azikheli Buffalo

Indigenous livestock proves more efficient than ‘improved’
exotic breeds in ensuring financial returns...


Introduction
Indigenous livestock proves more efficient than 'improved' exotic breeds in ensuring financial returns [1,2]. This is all the truer in a low-input/low-output subsistence oriented farming system with limited access to markets [3]. Indigenous animal genetic resources reared in marginal ecological settings are therefore increasingly gaining attention [4,5]. The buffalo is spine of the farmer's economy of India, South-Asia, and a few European and American nations [6], profiting almost 50% of humankind in more than 40 nations [7],The buffalo is a significant domesticated animal's asset in a few nations of South Asia and the Mediterranean areas. The buffalo involves a significant spot among the domesticated creatures as a supplier of dairy produce, beef, and draft power. Notwithstanding, reproductive proficiency is undermined because of known issues

ARTICLE INFO AbsTRACT
The Azikheli buffalo is a native breed to the Hindukush Mountains of Northern Pakistan. It is kept in its home tract by different social groups (landowners, Gujars, and tenants) under different topographic conditions (hill slopes, undulating areas, and valley bottoms). The present study evaluated the management effect of social groups and topographic conditions on key reproductive traits. Such results are important to identify the likely habitat and management type that can host an indigenous breed conservation programme with success. Data was collected through a structured questionnaire from a total of 225 households representing the social groups and topographic zones aforementioned and was analyzed through a one-way analysis of variance. The results showed that social groups had no significant effect on the reproductive traits studied except for the postpartum anoestrus interval which was short (P<0.05) for the buffaloes reared by tenants than by landowners. Azikheli buffalo reaches puberty earlier at the valley bottom (P<0.01) than other zones and has a longer postpartum anoestrus interval at the hill slope (P<0.05) than the undulating zone. The better overall first service conception (62.69%), number of services per conception (1.53±0.06) and calving interval (480.62±7.30 days) than other buffalo breeds under a variety of management conditions indicated a genotype-environment adaptability of the breed and warrants its conservation. Gujars with Azikheli herds and having a higher proportion of breeding bulls should be the primary recipients of a conservation programme.
of natural and board birthplaces, for example, absence of animal selections, and poor sustenance. The buffalo can use less quality roughages, adjust to harsher situations and are increasingly impervious to a few bovine-like tropical diseases. Their capacity to change over course feeds to milk and meat exceptional. In spite of these benefits, bison have moderately poor reproductive efficiency regardless of their area all through the world. Buffaloes displays a considerable lot of realized reproductive issues including postponed beginning of adolescence, poor oestrus articulation, longer baby blues, ovarian quiet, and above all brought down conception rates, especially when bred artificially [8]. In any case, higher fruitfulness could be accomplished through better taking care of and general administration [9,10].
Numerous authors refer that the hereditary changeability of reproductive characteristics in buffalo is low [11,12]. In any case, most selections that have been proposed by Indian, Egyptian, and Pakistani scientists consistently consider reproductive examples [13,14]. Reproductive efficiency is one of the most significant variables for profitability and beneficially of dairy animals, and it has essential calculate the influencing efficiency of female buffalo, buffalo is so alarmingly low that it represents an intense danger of financial misfortune to Indian and animal husbandry experts [15]. In such a situation, an abundant scope exists for expanding the reproductive productivity by alterations in conventional techniques for rearing, breeding, taking care of, and management, and infection control.
Buffaloes have their idiosyncrasy with respect to the reproductive qualities, females are occasional polyestrous breeders of short days, the adolescence buffalo is reached at age more than in the bovine, the recognition of estrus is progressively troublesome as a result of the estrus it occurs at sunrise and the females of buffalo have barely any physiological changes makers experience issues distinguishing estrus. The gestation period differs somewhere in the range of 300 and 320 days. Males have smaller outside reproductive organs and less extraordinary sexual conduct comparable to cattle.
Buffalo females show reproductive contrasts, for example, the hyper pigmented vulva and smaller and lighter, increasingly unbending and convolutedly internal structures with more muscle tone. There are a few favorable circumstances in the creation of buffaloes were proof, for example, their rusticity and adjustment to territories that would be unsuitable dairy cattle production, other than relying on items, for example, milk and meat of good quality. A few conventions of oestrus and ovulation synchronization have been embrace to improve reproductive effectiveness. These protocols have brought about a pregnancy rate increase of 30% to 50%. It is reasoned that buffalo breeding includes space inside the animal production framework, particularly in territories that would be appropriate for the breeding of other ruminant species [16].
The Azikheli buffalo is an animal genetic resource of the Hindukush Mountain range known by farmers in the region for its reproductive performance [17]. This buffalo breed is kept by different social groups including Gujars, tenants, and landowners , each having different management objectives affecting the productive and reproductive performances of the breed [18]. The in our previous manuscript [20].
To date, the extent to which management by social groups and topographic variability affect reproductive performance has not been evaluated [21]. This paper aims at filling this gap and intends to evaluate the effect of (1) social groups and (2)

Home Tract, Study Area and Socio-Ecological Attributes
The Azikhelli buffalo is reared in both sedentary and transhumant conditions. Its broader home tract includes the watersheds of the Swat River, the Panjkora River, and small tributary streams of the Indus River in (Figure 1). While the Azikheli buffalo breed is shown in (Figure 2). The study was conducted in three different ecological zones of Khwazakhela, namely, hill slopes , undulating areas , and valley bottoms by Gujars, landowners and tenants having different accesses to land, feed resources and livestock-rearing objectives.
The attributes of the social groups are given in Table 1. In winter, animals are fed intensively for two to four months based on the provisions of the ecological zone. Buffaloes on hill slopes are fed with hay followed by maize stalks and tree leaves and with grazing in summer. In the undulating zones, they are fed with wheat straw followed by maize stalks and hay grazing in summer, and stubbles in autumn. In the valley bottoms, wheat straw, rice straw, and crop residues are provided with some partial riparian grazing throughout the year and stubbles during spring and autumn.
Stall feeding is practiced by landowners while grazing is the main source of feeding from Gujars. Tenants feed their animals for partial stall feeding and grazing. Gujars are compelled to provide more concentrate during the first four months of lactation in comparison to tenant and landowner because of their dependency on milk sales.    [23,24]. A one-way analysis of variance with Tukey's multiple comparison post hoc test was used to analyze the effect of social groups and ecological zones on the above dependent variables.

Results
Ecological zones significantly affect the pubertal age by postponing the maturity of buffaloes reared on hill slopes when compared to those in undulating areas (P<0.05) and valley bottoms (P<0.05) ( Table 2). However, the difference is not significant (P>0.05) between undulating zones and valley bottoms.

Discussion
From hill slopes, the late attainment of puberty age compared to undulating zones (P<0.01) and valley bottoms (P<0.01) may be due to maize stalks based poor feeding [25,26]. [27] Reported that maize stalks feeding can delay the onset of puberty in buffaloes.
Poor feeding at hill slopes compared to undulating zones (P<0.05) also seems to be a cause of longer postpartum anoestrus interval in Azikheli buffalo as reported by [28]. The lack of any significant difference for the postpartum anoestrus interval at hill slopes in comparison to valley bottom is unclear despite better feeding at the valley bottoms. Irrational use of concentrate feed with a higher intake of protein diet at valley bottoms may be a contributing factor to this non-significance, which has been reported to be adversely affecting fertility [29,30]. The significantly (P<0.05) short postpartum anoestrus interval for Azikheli buffaloes reared by tenants when compared to those reared by landowners may be due to a comparatively lower milk yield with tenants than with landowners. Higher milk yield has been reported to prolong the postpartum anoestrus interval [31,32].
The first service conception rate (62.69 %) of the Azikheli buffalo is higher than the 50% recommended value for buffaloes [33]. Moreover the mean number of services per conception of Azikheli buffalo (1.53±0.06) can be considered satisfactory as 1.5 services per conception are reported to be satisfactory for a wellmanaged buffalo herd [33,34]. There was no significant effect of social group and ecological zones on first service conception rate, number of services per conception, and calving interval, indicating a genotype-environment adaptability of the breed [13].  [33], and 508.06±2.76 [40].
Different reasons have been given for late pubertal age in the literatures including genetic factors [41], feed scarcity and/or unavailability of balanced feed [6,26], and poor management [41][42][43]. However, our results suggest that for the Azikheli buffalo it is the feeding that significantly affects pubertal age. The overall mean calving interval observed in Azikheli buffalo (480.62±7.30 days) is better than for the Nili-Ravi buffalo breed but still below the ideal calving interval of 360 to 420 days [44].

Conclusion
The Azikheli buffalo is kept in its home tract by different The comparatively better reproductive performance of the Azikheli buffalo makes the Azikheli an important genetic resource in mountain environments and therefore warrants conservation of its key reproductive traits through appropriate breeding programs.

Conflict of Interest
All authors do not have any potential conflict of interest related to this research work.