Heat Stress in Female Farm Animals: A Review

Heat stress affects negatively reproductive performance offemale farm animals. The physiological backgrounds of such phenomenoninclude drawbacks in thermal balance, endocrine status, conception,uterine function, uterine blood flow, early embryonicdevelopment, fetal growth and milk production. Improvement of managementof females under hot climate conditions increases their reproductiveefficiency.Providing with suitable housing, feeding, disease and parasite controland heat stress alleviation practices, together with amelioration ofthe environment, can help heat stressed animals to express their geneticpotential in tropical and sub-tropical areas. This is in addition tocarrying out properly routine managerial practices at suitable times.Alleviation of heat stressed animals can be applied by physical, physiologicaland nutritional techniques.