1Centre for studies on Wildlife management and Health
Department of Veterinary Microbiology and Biotechnology, College of Veterinary and Animal Science, Rajasthan University of Veterinary and Animal Sciences, Bikaner-334001 (Rajasthan)
Online published on 19 December, 2013.
The somatic cell count (SCC) is a measure of the number of leukocytes and epithelial cells in milk and an increase in milk SCC is an indication of mammary gland inflammation caused by intramammary gland infections (IMI) and hence SCC can be used as a screening test to identify IMI. In the present investigation, 85 milk samples collected from (31) H-F crossbred and (54) Rathi cattle were subjected to somatic cell counting of which 38 samples (16 from H-F crossbred and 22 from Rathi cattle) revealed presence of two lacs or more cells/ml were included in the present investigation. The milk samples were collected from two locations from H-F cross-bred and from four locations from Rathi cattle. The average SCCs varied among locations. Overall the mean SCC in H-F crossbreds was higher (6.36 lacs/mL) as compared to that in milk from Rathi cattle (5.13 lac/mL). On the basis of somatic cell counts H-F crossbred cattle having more SCCs than the Rathi cattle is suggested to be more susceptible to SCM.In the present investigation, the range of SCCs varied between 2.07 and 22.56 lacs/mL in crossbred animals and between 2.56 and 13.21 lacs/ml in Rathi cattle. The data indicated lesser variations in the Rathi cattle than in the H-F crossbred animals. This finding may also be considered as an index of higher resistance of native breeds towards change in SCC due to various reasons.
