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| Milch Animal Management - Continued |
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| Indigenous dairy breeds produce 6-8 litres of milk a day where as foreign exotic breeds produce 60 litres of milk a day. Even the lactation period (period when milk is produced) is longer. To improve the production of milk of our Indian cows, crossbreeding programmes are conducted at various dairy research centres. The different types of breeding methods are: |
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| Inbreeding |
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| The process of mating among closely related individuals is known as inbreeding. Bulls that are healthy and strong are allowed to breed at random with grazing cows. Bulls unsuitable for breeding are castrated. These are called steers and are used for draught power. |
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| Out Breeding |
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| This involves breeding among unrelated animals. To increase the milk yield, Indian cows are crossbred with European breeds like Jersey, Holstein, Red Dane, Brown Swiss etc. |
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| Artificial Insemination |
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| In this process semen is collected from a bull of desirable breed and stored at freezing temperature. This semen is injected into the vagina of cows during the period of heat of the animal, for fertilization. This method has many advantages. |
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 As many as 3000 cows can be fertilized by the semen collected from one bull |
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 Frozen semen can be stored for a long period and transported to remote parts of the country |
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 This method is economical and gives high rate of fertilization |
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