Loading...
Theses
Browse
3 results
Search Results
ThesisItem Open Access Susceptibility of ducks to newcastle disease virus (NDV) and their role in the transmission of the disease to chicken(Department of veterinary and Animal Sciences, College of Veterinary and Animal Sciences, Mannuthy, 1981) Sudharma, D; KAU; Sulochana, SThe susceptibility of ducks to Newcastle disease virus and their possible role in the epizootiology of this disease were investigated. Cloacal and throat swabs and sera were collected from clinically normal as well as diseased ducks from different parts of Kerala. The swabs were tested for virus excertion by inoculating into the allantoic cavity of 10 day embryonated chicken eggs and the sera were examined for the presence of haemagglutination inhibition antibodies. Eight and one week – old ducklings were infected experimentally by different routes or methods to find out their susceptibility to this virus. A virulent strain of the virus received from Veterinary Biological Institute, Palode was employed for all experimental infection studies. Two week – old chickens were used for determining contact transmission. Inoculation of processed cloacal and throat swabs into the allantoic cavity of 10 day embryonated eggs resulted in the isolation of eleven haemagglutinating viruses from a total of 151 samples. The agglutination produced by these viruses were inhibited by specific ND antiserum, thereby confirming their identity as Newcastle disease virus. Out of a total of 226 serum samples collected from ducks, 34 showed HI antibodies ranging from 1:20 to 1:160 in the titre. Eight week – old ducklings infected intranasally and intraocularly showed symptoms of ND by third day of infection but recovered by the seventh day. All of them excreted the virus either through trachea, cloaca or by both the routes. Haemagglutination inhibition antibodies were demonstrable within two weeks of infection. The chickens kept in contact with the infected ducklings died after showing specific symptoms of newcastle disease. Postmortem examination revealed specific lesions and virus could be isolated from pooled tissue samples. Week – old ducklings could successfully be infected by intranasal/intraocular, subcutaneous, intramuscular or by contact infection. All the ducklings exposed to infection died after showing symptoms of pneumoencephalitis and diarrhoea. Virus was isolated from seventeen out of twenty five cases. Chickens placed in contact with subcutaneously infected ducklings died showing specific symptoms and lesions in ND and virus could be isolated from all the cases. The eight week – old ducklings although showed a clinical infection they could eventually recover following the development of antibodies in the system. Hence ducklings of eight weeks and above could be considered as resistant to newcastle disease virus infection. On the contrary week – old ducklings readily succumbed to the infection indicating their grater susceptibility. Contact transmission to chickens was possible from both age group of ducklings. The isolation of virus from clinically normal and diseased ducks showed that ducks excrete the virus without showing any clinical symptoms. It is also possible that some ducklings may show symptoms of the disease, but the development of antibody in the system leads to complete elimination of the virus. The results and the observation of the present study indicate that ducks can play an important role in the epizootiology of Newcastle disease by contracting infection from infected chicken or from other susceptible species and transmitting it to the incontact susceptible chicken.ThesisItem Open Access Bio-climatological studies on dry matter intake and water consumption of growing livestock(Department of Animal Management, College of Veterinary and Animal Sciences, Mannuthy, 1980) Somanathan, V L; KAU; Rajagopalan, T GThe present work was undertaken to study the distribution of climate at Mannuthy and to study the effect of the prevailing ambient temperature and relative humidity on the performance of growing crossbred cattle. The meterological data over a period of five years (1974 – 1978) were analysed to study the climatic picture of this locality. The rectal temperature, respiration rate, dry matter intake, water consumption and growth rate of eleven male and five female calves were observed for a period of twelve months. The climatic picture showed that there are two distinct seasons prevailing in this locality, namely, the dry and the rainy seasons, which are further sub divided into ‘Warm and dry’, ‘Hot and dry’, ‘Cold and wet’ and ‘Warm and wet’ seasons, respectively. The rectal temperature of the animals remained fairly constant throughout the year, inspite of wide variations in the ambient temperature. It showed negative correlation with ambient temperature (-0.357 in males and -0.207 in females) and positive correlation with relative humidity which was significantly only in males (0.416). The respiration rate varied from 30.973 per minute during July (lowest) to 49.230 per minute during April (highest). It showed positive correlation with ambient temperature (0.638 in males and 0.561 in females). Significant negative correlation between respiration rate and relative humidity was observed in males only (-0.253). The percentage dry matter intake was found to have a strong negative correlation with ambient temperature (-0.652 in males and -0.685 in females). Whereas with the relative humidity, the correlation was positive and was significant only in males (0.514). Highly significant positive correlation between ambient temperature and daily water consumption (0.763 in males and o.748 in females) and negative correlation between relative humidity and water consumption (-0.725 in males and -0.503 in females) were obtained in this study. There was negative correlation between ambient temperature and monthly weight gain and positive correlation between relative humidity and monthly weight gain, but was significant only in males. The negative correlation obtained in this case can be attributed to the poor quality of the roughage during the summer months rather than the direct effect of ambient temperature.ThesisItem Open Access Evaluation of the nutritive values of pulse proteins with and without supplementation of amino acids(Department of Nutrition Laboratory, College of Veterinary and Animal Sciences, Mannuthy, 1975) Sivaraman, E; KAU; Chandra Menon, KThree series of feeding trials were carried out using growing albino rats as experimental subjects during the present investigation in order to assess (1) the comparative effects of feeding raw and autoclaved cowpea and raw and autoclaved tur dhal incorporated in the diet each at 10% protein level on nitrogen basis on specific physiological functions such as growth, nitrogen balance, blood formation, liver fat, liver protein and liver and serum enzymes (2) the relative merits of these diets on feeding on the various physiological functions on supplementation with methionine and tryptophane and (3) the improvements brought about in respect of the various physiological functions when autoclaved pulses are incorporated in the diets at 18% protein level on nitrogen basis and fed. These experiments were performed in continuation of the work carried out by the author for the M.Sc. degree on the nutritive values of the two pulses, viz., turdhal and cowpea. The salient observations made during the course of the three series of experiments carried out during the course of the present investigation and the obviously important inferences drawn from the results obtained are given below, series wise:- FIRST SERIES OF EXPERIMENTS (1) Diets containing raw cowpea and raw tur dhal each containing 10% protein on nitrogen basis do not support somatic growth in rats. (2) Both autoclaved cowpea and autoclaved tur dhal diets each containing 10% protein on nitrogen basis promote growth of rats, the average gin in weight in both instances being essentially the same. (3) Autoclaved cowpea and autoclaved tur dhal diets are inferior to the control diet in promoting growth response. (4) Growth rate is not influenced by food consumption as little variation is shown in this respect between the animals fed the different diets. (5) Autoclaved cowpea and autoclaved tur dhal diets give significantly higher protein efficiency values than the corresponding raw pulse diets, both these registering essentially identical values in this respect, but significantly lower values as compared with the control diet. (6) In regard to nitrogen retention the results show the same trend as protein efficiency values. (7) Digestibility coefficients of nutrients in the xx autoclaved cowpea and tur dhal diets are significantly higher than of those in the respective raw pulse diets but less so as compared with the control diet, the raw pulse diets showing no significant difference between them. (8) The diets used in the present study do not show any significant difference between them in their ability to support red cell, haemoglobin and plasma protein concentrations. (9) Glutamic oxalo acetic transaminase and glutamic pyruvic transaminase concentrations in serum and liver are not significantly influenced by any one of the diets used in the present study, although on the raw cowpea diet and on the raw tur dhal diet comparatively lower values for glutamic pyruvic transaminase are obtained. (10) Liver glycogen is not significantly influenced by any of the diets used in the present study. (11) Diets containing raw cowpea and raw tur dhal bring about on feeding significantly higher liver fat content as compared with the control diet and the autoclaved tur dhal diet. As between the autoclaved pulse diets no significant difference is observed. (12) As regards the liver protein content no significant difference is discernible between the diets used in the present study. (13) The autoclaved pulse diets increase significantly the weight of liver, kidney and heart as compared with raw pulse diets. (14) The raw cowpea and raw tur dhal diets bring about on feeding significantly higher caecal weight in rats as compared with the control diet, the raw tur dhal diet bringing about significantly higher caecal weights than the autoclaved tur dhal diet. (15) On the autoclaved pulse diets, significantly lower weights for pancreas are obtained as compared with the raw pulse diets. While no significant difference is observed in pancreatic weights between animals fed raw cowpea diet and autoclaved cowpea diet, significantly higher pancreatic weight is observed in the case of animals maintained on the raw tur dhal diet as compared with the diet containing autoclaved tur dhal. SECOND SERIES OF EXPERIMENTS (1) Diets containing raw cowpea and raw tur dhal both supplemented with methionine and tryptophane promote growth in rate in contrast with the results observed in the first series of experiments with raw cowpea and raw tur dhal without supplementation with these limiting amino acids. Significantly higher growth rate is obtained in the present series of experiments, with diet containing tur dhal as compared with that containing cowpea. (2) As regards the amino acid supplemented autoclaved pulse diets, both promote significantly higher growth, diet containing autoclaved tur dhal exerting significantly higher influence than diet containing autoclaved cowpea. (3) Autoclaved pulse diets supplemented with the limiting amino acids, methionine and tryptophane promote significantly better growth in rats than the control diet. (4) Supplementation of diets containing raw or autoclaved cowpea and raw or autoclaved tur dhal, with methionine and tryptophane significantly enhances their protein efficiency values. (5) The autoclaved cowpea and tur dhal diets supplemented with methionine and tryptophane register significantly higher protein efficiency values as compared with the control diet, the amino acid supplemented tur dhal diet signalling and significantly higher value in this regard than the amino acid supplemented autoclaved cowpea diet. (6) Autocalving cowpea and tur dhal brings about with or without methionine and tryptophane supplementation a higher nitrogen retention in rats than the raw pulse diets, maximum nitrogen retention being obtained with the control diet. (7) As between the amino acid supplemented raw and autoclaved cowpea diets on one hand and the amino acid supplemented raw and autoclaved tur dhal diets on the other, no significant difference is observed in nitrogen retention. (8) Supplementation with methionine and tryptophane significantly enhances protein digestibility in diets irrespective of the fact, whether the diets contain raw or autoclaved cowpea or raw or autoclaved tur dhal. (9) Supplementation with methionine and tryptophane does not influence the digestibility of fat while carbohydrate digestibility is seen to be significantly increased in the case of the amino acid supplemented raw cowpea diet as compared with that in the amino acid supplemented tur dhal diet. (10) Supplementation with methionine and tryptophane does not bring about any beneficial effect on the digestibility of carbohydrate either in the case of autoclaved cowpea diet or in the case of autoclaved tur dhal diet. (11) As regards red cell and haemoglobin concentrations, no significant difference is observed between the animals maintained on the various diets. In respect of plasma protein concentration, however, a significantly higher concentration of plasma protein is observed in animals receiving the raw cowpea diet supplemented with methionine and tryptophane as compared with those maintained on the amino acid supplemented raw tur dhal diet. (12) In respect of maintenance of glutamic oxalo acetic transaminase and glutamic pyruvic transaminase levels in serum and liver and liver glycogen content, the diets used in the present study do not show any significant difference between them. (13) On raw tur dhal diet supplemented with methionine and tryptophane, significantly higher liver fat content is observed as compared with that obtained on the raw cowpea diet supplemented with these amino acids. (14) As regards liver protein no significant difference attributable to the diet is observed. (15) A significantly higher increase in the weight of livers of rats maintained on the diet containing raw cowpea supplemented with methionine and tryptophane is discernible as compared with those of animals fed the tur dhal diet supplemented with the same amino acids. (16) The caecae with contents, of rats maintained on diets containing raw tur dhal supplemented with methionine and tryptophane show significantly higher weights as compared with those of animals fed the amino acids supplemented autoclaved cowpea and autoclaved tur dhal diets showing no significant difference in this respect. (17) Significantly higher pancreatic weights are observed in the case of rats maintained on diets containing raw cowpea supplemented with methionine and tryptophane as compared with the same of animals receiving an isoprotoimictur dhal diet. As between the amino acid supplemented autoclaved cowpea and tur dhal diets, there is no significant difference. THIRD SERIES OF EXPERIMENTS (1) Autoclaved cowpea diet at 18% protein level on nitrogen basis promotes a significantly higher growth response than an isoproteimictur dhal diet. (2) As regards protein efficiency, the two pulse protein diets do not show any significant difference between them. (3) Red cell and haemoglobin concentrations are not seen influenced by either of the diets. (4) The limited data obtained during the course of the present study do not indicate any appreciable difference between the diets in their ability to support physiological functions such as reproduction and lactation. The significance of the above influences is discussed briefly.