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Mini cows but maxi milk

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Title Mini cows but maxi milk
 
Creator Technical Centre for Agricultural and Rural Cooperation
 
Description Mini-cows produce more meat and milk per hectare than normal sized animals. This is the claim of a Mexican veterinarian who, over the last 17 years, has bred Brahman cattle to be smaller rather than larger. Dr Jose Berruecos, Director of the Faculty of Veterinary Studies, Mexico City, originally took 30 Brahman cattle and bred from the smallest. After five generations of breeding there are now 12 mini calves and 18 adults. Each is about a metre high and weighs about 150 kg. This is a quarter of the weight of a normal Brahman cow.



Dr Berruecos claims smallness is a great advantage: ten mini cows can be kept on the same area as one normal cow; their total production is 1500 kg per hectare compared to just 600 kg from a single large animal; the small animal lends itself better to small plots farmed by the smallholder; and the mini cows yield 3.5 to 4 litres of milk/day, which could be enough to sustain one family in milk.



Other advantages of the mini-cows are that they are friendlier, easier to handle and need less fencing. Dr Berruecos hopes to cross them with Jersey cows to increase their milk production



For more details, contact:



Faculty of Veterinary Studies

National Autonomous University

Mexico City

MEXICO
Mini-cows produce more meat and milk per hectare than normal sized animals. This is the claim of a Mexican veterinarian who, over the last 17 years, has bred Brahman cattle to be smaller rather than larger. Dr Jose Berruecos, Director of the...
 
Date 2014-10-02T13:13:34Z
2014-10-02T13:13:34Z
1988
 
Type News Item
 
Identifier CTA. 1988. Mini cows but maxi milk. Spore 13. CTA, Wageningen, The Netherlands.
1011-0054
https://hdl.handle.net/10568/44797
 
Language en
 
Relation Spore, Spore 13
 
Publisher CTA
 
Source Spore