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What are the common diseases and symptoms in yak?

Diseases	Symptoms
Bacterial diseases HS Black Quarter	High fever, dyspnea, swelling of throat region High fever, crepitating swelling and lameness
Viral diseases FMD	Fever, vesicles and ulcers on tongue, lameness
Protozoan diseases Babesiosis	Off feed, coffee coloured urine, high fever, sudden drop in milk production
Endo parasites	Diarrhea, pot belly, stunted growth, rough body coat
Ecto parasites	Restlessness, alopecia, decreased milk production

What is the control of measures for common external parasites in yak?

For animal Deltamethrin as prescribed/manufacturers applied externally or ivermectin injection @ 200 g/Kg Body weight subcutaneous route.

What is the prophylactic measures for clean milk?

•	First stripping of milk should be checked carefully.
•	Udder should completely be evacuated in each milking.
•	Teat dip solutions like iodophores /savlon should be applied on teats after the milking.
•	Milking should be carried out with full hand.
•	Ensure that animal should not sit immediately after milking (i.e. it has to stand up at least 10-20 minutes once milking is done).
•	Proper hygiene of animal, milking byre, milker shed and milking utensils needs to be maintained.

What do you mean by a complete feed? How do it is prepared?

A Complete feed consists of roughages and concentrate mixtures and may be in mash, pelleted or block form. For preparing complete feed, forage, concentrate ingredients and additives/ supplements are blended together as to get the required quantity of protein/ energy/ minerals/ vitamins. The complete feed system would help in utilizing the locally available crop residues, agro-industrial by products and wastes that are fit for animal feeding. Usually roughage and concentrate ratio is being maintained as 60:40. Complete feed provides the best avenue to incorporate the urea in the ration of livestock. For high yielding cows 50:50 roughage: concentrate is usually adequate.

What is complete feed block?

Complete feed block is an intimate mixture of processed ingredients including roughage and concentrate parts designed to be the sole source of feed in compressed form. It may be square, circular or quadrangular depending on the type of dye used in the machine.
Complete Feed Block (CFB) Technology is the latest development in the direction to exploit the potential of locally available animal feed resources besides using non-conventional feed resources in a better way that makes livestock farming an economically viable enterprise to fulfill the increasing demands of growing human population in the state.

How to select bull yak for breeding?

A bull is equal to half of the herd. Therefore, selection of bulls with superior traits is desirable to improve the production of the herd. In organized herd, bulls are selected initially on the basis of the performance of mother (dam) and breeding soundness like libido, semen qualities and physical structure. Subsequently their semen is used through artificial insemination (AI) to produce calves. Selection of bulls is finally made on the basis of performance of their progenies. Under field condition similar procedure may be adopted, if possible to select superior bulls.

How to maintain low inbreeding? Is artificial insemination (AI) service is available?

Use of some bulls to cover a yak population for larger period will cause inbreeding i.e. the variation in the herd will be less and there will be reduced performance of growth, production immunity etc. To reduced inbreeding bulls of different origin may be used i.e. variation is introduced in the herd. Bulls used for two years in a herd may be exchanged with bulls of another herd will help in reducing inbreeding. The AI technique is useful for the purpose.
At ICAR-National Research Centre on Yak, Dirang, Arunachal Pradesh superior bulls are selected in the farm; their semen is tested and frozen for further use. From single ejaculation only one cow is inseminated, whereas 200 cows can be inseminated through AI. ICAR-NRCY provides AI service to farmers as well as providing selected bulls to the farmers for natural service also and this is helping to reduce inbreeding under field condition.

Is there any technology to improve productive and reproductive efficiency of yak?

Yes. Artificial Insemination (A.I.) and estrous synchronization technique is available with the institute.

How to avail the technology for improving productive and reproductive efficiency of yak and what is expected from the farmers end for effective use of the technology?

For availing the technologies for improving productive and reproductive efficiency.