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Ruminants
Special Issues
Trends on Ruminants’ Husbandry, Breeding, Product Quality and Environmental Footprint
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Trends on Ruminants’ Husbandry, Breeding, Product Quality and Environmental Footprint

A special issue of Ruminants (ISSN 2673-933X).

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (15 August 2023) | Viewed by 1325

Special Issue Editors

Dr. George P. Laliotis

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Laboratory of Animal Breeding and Husbandry, Department of Animal Science, Agricultural University of Athens, 75 Iera Odos, 11855 Athens, Greece
Interests: animal husbandry; climate change and livestock production; physiology of productive traits; farm animals’ communication; DNA polymorphisms and productive traits
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Dr. Linda Majdoub-Mathlouthi

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Department of Animal Production, Institut Supérieur Agronomique Chott Meriem, Université de Sousse, Sousse 4042, Tunisia
Interests: animal production; milk and meat quality; dietary supplements; animal feed; animal nutrition; energy metabolism

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

We are pleased to announce a Special Issue on the Ruminants journal entitled “Trends on Ruminants’ Husbandry, Breeding, Product Quality and Environmental Footprint”.  Ruminant production systems form a vital source of human nutrition, income, and social cohesion. A variety of products are produced through ruminant farming worldwide (milk, meat, hides, wool, and energy). On the other hand, ruminants are considered a major contributor to environmental problems, including climate change. Greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, water use and water quality, and biodiversity remain as issues of major importance. Novel trends on human nutrition, the need for easily adapted mitigation strategies for a greener footprint, as well as the increased concern around animal welfare lead to the need for alternative husbandry and breeding techniques, new approaches to genetic aspects, early recognition of abnormal situations, and assurances regarding animals’ health and final product quality.

We invite original research papers and comprehensive review articles on recent advances in the ruminant sector, including (but not limited to) husbandry and breeding strategies; genomic, transcriptomic, proteomic, and epigenomic research; conservation of genetic diversity; product quality; animal monitoring; identification of behavioral traits to improve animal welfare; adaptation and mitigation strategies toward climate change and water scarcity; and circular-economy-related issues.

You are welcome to send short proposals for feature paper submissions to the Editorial Office (ruminants@mdpi.com) before submission.

We look forward to receiving your submissions.

Dr. George P. Laliotis
Dr. Linda Majdoub-Mathlouthi
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Ruminants is an international peer-reviewed open access quarterly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1000 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • ruminants
  • cattle
  • sheep
  • goat
  • dairy
  • beef
  • genetics
  • welfare
  • animal monitoring
  • emissions

Published Papers (1 paper)

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Research

13 pages, 886 KiB  
Article
Behavioral and Morphological Traits of Nellore Cattle That Can Influence Calf Survival and Performance from Birth to Weaning
by Mateus José Rodrigues Paranhos da Costa, João Vitor de Toledo Menezes, Luane da Silva Fernandes and Tiago S. Valente
Ruminants 2023, 3(4), 347-359; https://doi.org/10.3390/ruminants3040029 - 01 Nov 2023
Viewed by 759
Abstract
This study aimed to identify behavioral and morphological traits of Nellore cattle that can influence calves’ survival and pre-weaning performance. It was performed in two units of a large-scale cow–calf operation farm located in the Central-West region of Brazil, with 975 cow–calf dyads, [...] Read more.
This study aimed to identify behavioral and morphological traits of Nellore cattle that can influence calves’ survival and pre-weaning performance. It was performed in two units of a large-scale cow–calf operation farm located in the Central-West region of Brazil, with 975 cow–calf dyads, by scoring cows’ maternal protective behavior, body condition, horns, udder suspension (US), teat size (TS) and calves’ vigor. TS was used to determine teat symmetry (TSm). The production unit where calves were born, their birth date, sex, and birth (BW) and weaning weights were also recorded. Cow ages at calving and production units were used to categorize the cows into twelve classes (Cage). The Shapiro–Wilk test alongside tables of frequencies were used to determine if continuous and categorical variables followed a normal distribution, respectively. Two datasets were considered in statistical analyses: (i) 975 dyad records were used to identify potential factors influencing calf survivability and (ii) 936 records of weaned calves were used to assess pre-weaning performance. Generalized linear models were used to assess the effect of target traits on the calves’ weight adjusted for 210 days of age (W210, kg) and pre-weaning average daily gain (preADG, kg/day). Tukey’s test was used to compare W210 and preADG means. Pearson’s correlation coefficients were estimated between BW, W210 and preADG. Cage, US and the TSm significantly affected pre-weaning calf performance (p < 0.01). Older cows (independently of the production unit) and those with intermediate US and symmetrical teats weaned heavier calves. As expected, positive and significant correlation was observed between BW and preADG (r = 0.35), which, in turn, was highly correlated with W210 (r = 0.99). We concluded that none of the behavioral and morphological traits influenced calf survivability, but cow age, US and TSm impacted pre-weaning performance, with 8- to 11-year-old cows and those with intermediate US and symmetric teats leading to better calf performance at weaning. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Trends on Ruminants’ Husbandry, Breeding, Product Quality and Environmental Footprint)
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