Genetic and Non-Genetic factors affecting body weight of buffaloes

The present experiment was conducted on 60 randomly selected dairy units consisting of 116 Graded Murrah,70 Diara type and 121 Non-descript type buffalo cows utilizing the procedure of "stratified random sampling with proportional allocation (Snedecor & Cochran,1967) in and around Patna.Genetic factors were the three different genetic groups of buffaloes viz. Graded murrah,Diara and Non-descript types prevalent in Bihar.Where as Non-genetic factors included in the study were location of herd,faming system and sequence of lactation.The average estimates of body weight of Graded murrah, Diara and Non-descript were found to be 508.972+3.36, 461.789+3.32 and 483.857+3.30 kg respectively. The three genetic groups of buffaloes differed significantly (p<0.05) among themselves with respect to their body weight.Farming system and lactation order had significant(p<0.01) influence on body weight. Body weight of the animals was the lowest at first parity and then increased significantly (p<0.05) in subsequent parities.