Indian Journal of Animal Research

Somatic Cell Count (SCC) is an indicator to detect mastitis in individual cows. The SCC was measured from individual milk samples of 275 animals comprising of 164 HF crossbreds, 51 Deoni and 60 Ongole breeds of cattle. The mean milk yield of Deoni, Ongole and HF crossbred cows was 824.44 ± 149.99, 479.73 ± 141.14 and 5572.15 ± 115.28 kg, respectively. The mean SCC in Deoni, Ongole and HF crossbred cows were 1.95 ± 0.24, 1.57 ± 0.22 and 4.14 ± 0.17 lakhs cells per ml of milk, respectively. Crossbred cows showed significantly (P<0.05) higher milk yield than the native breeds of Deoni and Ongole cows. SCC was significantly (P<0.05) higher in crossbred cows compared to native animals. The mean somatic cell count (16.77 ± 1.50 x 10⁵ cells/ml) was significantly high (P<0.01) in mastitis affected HF crossbred than all other normal animals viz, Deoni, Ongole and HF crossbred normal cow's milk samples. High mean SCC was noticed at third stage of milking in crossbred mastitis cows (15.65 ± 1.08 x 10⁵ cells/ml). Changes in milk yield during different stages of lactation were significant (P<0.05) and there was no effect on stage of lactation on SCC. The changes in SCC during different seasons were significant (p<0.01). The SCC was high during flush and low during lean in Deoni and HF crossbred cattle, where as in Ongole the SCC was high at lean season. SCC was increased with increasing number of lactation in Deoni cows. The highest SCC value (18.56 ± 1.11 x10⁵ cells/ml) was observed at 4^th parity in HF mastitis animals.