Reproduction and Lactational Performance of Cattle in a Smallholder Dairy System in Zimbabwe

A study was conducted in two adjacent locations. Nharira (communal) and Lancashire (small-scale commercial) farming areas in Zimbabwe to characterize the breeds and evaluate the reproductive and lactation performance of dairy cattle under smallholder management. The types of cows identified were Friesian, Jersey and Red Dane, and an indigenous Sanga breed called the Mashona and its crossbreds. Both sectors used more exotic and crossbred cows than indigenous cows. The mean monthly weights of the dairy cows were higher in Lancashire than in Nharira and the calving intervals were longer in Nharira than in Lancashire. The mean age at first calving was higher and the mean total lactation yields were greater in Nharira than in Lancashire, but the mean 305-day lactation yields were not significantly different. The mean lactation lengths were longer for the cows from Nharira. It was concluded that the reproductive and lactation performances were low. The calving intervals were extended, probably owing to suboptimal nutrition and heat stress, particularly during the dry season, and to poor management practices, such as delayed mating due to the poor availability of bulls.     

Dairy Production and Reproduction by Crosses of Holstein,Jersey or Brown Swiss Sires with Holstein-Friesian/Gir Dams

The performance was compared of cows sired by Holstein, Jersey or Brown Swiss bulls out of Holstein-Friesian×Gir dams of 1/2 to 3/4 Holstein-Friesian content. The animals were kept in a single herd under the same management. The data were analysed by least-squares techniques under a model that included the fixed effects of breed of sire, Bos taurus fraction of the dam, parity, year and season of calving, and a random cow effect. Based on 480 observations, the milk yields per lactation for the Holstein, Jersey and Brown Swiss sired groups were 2821±163, 2320±61 and 2418±119 kg, respectively. The corresponding means for fat yield per lactation were 96.9±6.6, 86.8±2.5 and 92.8±4.8 kg; for protein yield per lactation were 85.3±5.1, 71.3±1.9 and 76.3±3.7 kg; for lactation length, 339±18, 283±7 and 313±14 days for fat percentage, 3.37±0.10, 3.73±0.04 and 3.77±0.07%; and for protein percentage, 3.02±0.05, 3.10±0.02 and 3.16±0.04%. The respective calving intervals were 487±24, 408±11 and 461±245 days. The yields of milk and protein per day of calving interval were similar in the Jersey and Holstein sired groups, while the former had higher yields of fat, implying that production economics might favour the smaller Jersey crosses in production systems in which the males were not reared. Crossing with Brown Swiss did not improve performance over the Holstein sired crosses.     

Evaluating environmental impacts of the Japanese beef cow–calf system by the life cycle assessment method

The objectives of this study were to evaluate the environmental impacts of a beef cow–calf system using a life cycle assessment (LCA) method and to investigate the effects of scenarios to reduce environmental impacts on the LCA results. The functional unit was defined as one marketed beef calf, and the processes associated with the cow–calf life cycle, such as feed production, feed transport, animal management, the biological activity of the animal and the treatment of cattle waste were included in the system boundary. The present results showed that the total contributions of one beef calf throughout its life cycle to global warming, acidification, eutrophication and energy consumption were 4550 kg of CO₂ equivalents, 40.1 kg of SO₂ equivalents, 7.0 kg of phosphate (PO₄) equivalents and 16.1 GJ, respectively. The contribution of each process to the total environmental impact in each environmental impact category showed a similar tendency to the contribution of each process in each environmental category reported in the case of the beef fattening system as a whole. The results from this analysis showed that shortening calving intervals by 1 month reduced environmental impacts by 5.7–5.8% in all the environmental impact categories examined in the current study, and increasing the number of calves per cow also reduced environmental impacts in all the categories, although the effects were smaller.     

Effects of deficit irrigation strategies on cluster microclimate for improving fruit composition of Moscatel field-grown grapevines

The grapevine plays a very important role in the economic, social and cultural sectors of many regions; however vineyards are often grown in regions under stressful conditions and thus they are vulnerable to climate change. The objective of this research was to investigate the effect of partial root-zone drying (PRD) irrigation on vine water relations, vegetative growth, plant microclimate, berry composition and yield components, compared to conventional deficit irrigation (DI, 50% ETc), full irrigation (FI, 100% of ETc) and non-irrigated vines (NI). The study was undertaken in mature ‘Moscatel’ grapevines (Vitis vinifera L.) grown in Pegões, South of Portugal. Compared to the other irrigated treatments, PRD vines showed a better microclimate at the cluster zone with higher incident photosynthetic photon flux density (PPFD). Within the more open canopies of NI and PRD treatments, berry temperatures were higher than those of denser ones (DI and FI). Compared to the conventional irrigation technique the better microclimate observed in PRD vines was a consequence of a reduction in vine growth, where lower values of leaf layer number, leaf area, canopy wideness, water shoots and shoot weight were observed. In PRD vines we observed a tendency to a development of a deeper root system, while DI and FI showed a more homogeneous root distribution throughout the different soil layers. PRD showed an improvement in berry quality with higher values of flavour precursors, and total phenols concentration without any significant yield reduction compared to DI and FI.     

暗期间断在植物生长发育中的应用研究(英文)

暗期间断属于光周期调控技术,被广泛应用于植物的生长发育研究。通过对暗期间断的类型、应用和机理三个方面研究成果进行了综述,其中在暗期间断类型部分总结了光质、间断暗期的次数和间隔时间方面的研究;在暗期间断应用部分总结了在植物形态发生、生理和生物化学方面的相关研究。在此基础上,提出了暗期间断在分子生物学研究及森林资源保护中的应用前景。     

一种恢复渠道中线测量的快捷方法

渠道是农田水利建设的一个重要工程，渠道测量在渠道兴、改、扩建中具有重要的地位和作用。仅就施工过程中如何快捷恢复渠道中线的测量方法作了探讨，并对恢复中线的精度作了相应分析。     

云南撒坝猪H-FABP基因多态性及与部分生产性能的关系

采用PCR-RFLP技术检测H-FABP基因5′上游区1125~1817区段HinfⅠ酶切位点在撒坝猪群体中的多态性分布,并采用最小二乘分析模型初步统计分析检测位点多态性与部分生产性能的相关性。结果表明,H-FABP基因等位基因H及基因型Hh在群体中占优势,频率分别为0.6022和0.4194;H-FABP基因在群体中处于Hardy-Weinberg平衡状态;H-FABP基因检测位点基因型间在生长和繁殖性状上不存在不利影响。     

2022年夏季汉江中下游水华生消驱动因子及其贡献率量化研究

2022年夏季，长江流域遭遇了罕见的“汛期反枯”极端水文事件，在此期间，汉江中下游首次发现了蓝藻水华。本研究选取叶绿素a浓度作为衡量水华的关键指标，基于偏最小二乘回归（Partial least squares regression，PLSR）量化了不同环境因子对2022年夏季汉江中下游（仙桃、宗关断面）水华生消的贡献率。结果表明：（1）仙桃和宗关断面叶绿素a浓度与溶解氧、pH值和水温均呈现出显著的正相关关系。溶解氧、pH值和水温对2022年夏季汉江中下游水华生消的贡献程度最高，三者对仙桃和宗关断面水华生消的贡献率分别为15.18%、13.68%、14.50%和18.06%、15.93%、15.65%。（2）基于偏最小二乘路径模型（Partial Least Squares Path Modeling，PLS-PM），本研究进一步解析了各环境因子对叶绿素a浓度变化的影响路径。结果表明气象因子是2022年夏季汉江中下游蓝藻水华暴发的诱导因子，高温无雨的极端天气导致水温和pH上升，加速了藻类的代谢反应速率。同时，河道流量减小延长了有机物和营养盐的传输和滞留时间，为藻类生长提供了稳定的营养条件。并且水华“萌发”时段可能与汉江中下游“涝旱急转”时段重叠。因此，本文建议下一步研究应结合准确的中长期气象预报信息，在“涝旱急转”时段实时优化汉江中下游水华防控调度的下泄流量与下泄时机，这将有可能大大提高水华防控的效率和效果。     

Prediction of watermelon quality based on vibration spectrum

Judging watermelon quality based on its apparent properties such as size or skin color is difficult. A non-destructive method is employed here, based on vibrational response spectrum, to determine the quality indices of watermelon (Charleston gray). The responses of samples to vibration excitation were recorded by laser Doppler vibrometry (LDV). The phase shift between input and output signals were extracted over a wide frequency range. The total soluble solids (TSS), titratable acidity (TA) and TSS/TA ratio also measured as watermelon quality characters. Stepwise multiple linear regression (SMLR) as well as partial least square regression (PLS) was applied to extracted vibration spectrums to construct prediction models of watermelon quality. The results showed that performance of SMLR models were better than PLS. The determination coefficients (R²) of SMLR validation models were 0.9976, 0.9985 and 0.9542 for TSS, TA and TSS/TA respectively. It is likely that reduction of cell wall materials to soluble solids during ripening process changes viscoelastic properties of watermelon reflected by vibrational response. This study demonstrated the feasibility of mentioned method for predicting the quality of watermelons in an industrial grading system.     

Response of grain yield and related agronomic traits of oilseed flax to diversified cropping rotations北大核心CSCD

This research aimed to identify a suitable planting pattern for oilseed flax production in a dry-farming region. A long-term field experiment was started in 2012 with a 4-year crop rotation cycle,designed to measure the effects on flax crop performance of previous crop,and various patterns of flax planting interval within the four-year rotation,compared with continuous flax cropping. Crop parameters measured included plant height,stem diameter,dry matter accumulation and distribution,and the experiment included six different crop rotation patterns：Flax→flax →flax→flax［（F）FFF］;Flax→wheat→potato→flax［（F）WPF］;Flax→potato→flax→wheat［（F）PFW］;Flax→ flax→wheat→potato［（F）FWP］;Flax→wheat→flax→potato［（F）WFP］and flax→wheat→potato→wheat［（F）WPW］. Results for the ninth year showed significantly increased grain yield（29. 89%-109. 57%）in crop rotation treatments compared with continuous cropping of oilseed flax. The ranking of the six tested rotations for yield was：（F）WPW>（F）FWP>（F）WFP>（F）PFW>（F）WPF>（F）FFF. The grain yield of oilseed flax was significantly affected by previous crop,frequency and years interval of flax cropping and number of years of continuous flax cropping. Yield was increased by 54. 45%-59. 29% under wheat stubble and potato stubble compared with oilseed flax stubble,and increased by 30. 66% and 109. 57%,respectively,under 50% and 25% frequencies,compared with 100% frequency. The grain yield of oilseed flax under two-year continuous cropping was higher by 29. 89% than four-year continuous cropping,and increased with increase in years interval between flax crops. Correlation analysis identified a significantly positive correlation between oilseed flax grain yield and effective capsule number,branch number and 1000-seed weight. The effective capsule number,branch number and 1000-seed weight of oilseed flax under rotation treatment were increased by 35. 88%-108. 91%,15. 47%-46. 19% and 14. 61%-16. 34%,respectively（P<0. 05）,compared with continuous cropping. In addition,the high grain yield of oilseed flax was accompanied by an increase in plant height,stem diameter and dry matter accumulation and these increases were,respectively,5. 11%-42. 24%,2. 77%-39. 92% and 31. 25%-117. 89% under the rotation regimes,compared with continuous cropping. Reduction in the number of years of continuous cropping years,change of crop stubble,decreased flax planting frequency and increased of interval between flax crops also improved flax crop performance. In summary,crop rotation improved the vigor of oilseed flax,resulting in greater plant height and stem diameter,improved dry matter accumulation and distribution,leading to increased branch number,effective capsule number and 1000-seed weight,and increase in the crop yield of oilseed flax. The results indicated that a multiple-crop rotation pattern was an effective way to avoid the yield reduction caused by continuous cropping in oilseed flax. The rotation： Flax→wheat→potato→wheat performed best among those tested and can be recommended as an appropriate cropping rotation for oilseed flax production in the dry region of northwest China. © 2022 Editorial Office of Acta Prataculturae Sinica. All rights reserved.