GROWTH PERFORMANCE AND HORMONAL PROFILE OF NEWBORN CALVES AFTER PRE-PARTUM SELENIUM INJECTION OF THEIR DAMS

YOUSSEF, RAOUF H.; MOHAMED, OMYMA M.; HASSANIN, HASSAN A.; GABR, MOUNER E. A.

doi:10.21608/ejar.2000.400985

GROWTH PERFORMANCE AND HORMONAL PROFILE OF NEWBORN CALVES AFTER PRE-PARTUM SELENIUM INJECTION OF THEIR DAMS

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

¹ Animal Health Research Institute, Agricultural Research Centre, Dokki, Giza, Egypt

² Animal Reproduction Research Institute, Agricultural Research Centre, Dokki, Giza, Egypt

³ Faculty of Science, Ain Shams University, Cairo, Egypt

10.21608/ejar.2000.400985

Abstract

Ten Friezian cows at late stage of gestation were intramuscularly injected with 100 mg of selenium as sodium selenite at a rate of two doses with one week in-between. Seven pregnant animals were left without treatment as controls. Weight of their calves at birth and every week for 15 week were recorded, and blood samples on 1,10, 20, 30 & 40 days post-natal were taken for hormonal analysis. Selenium supplementation improved the live body weight of calves with a mean 10.7 Kg extra gain and a mean 13..74% faster growth rate at the end of experimental period. The overall mean of weight gain and relative growth rate of calves per week were significantly increased (4.24 vs. 3.64 kg and 8.42 vs. 7.84%, respectively). Serum growth hormone (total, free and binding forms), prolactin (total and binding forms) and thyrotrophic hormone of one day old calves were significantly increased after dam supplementation. Furthermore, selenium exerted its favourable effect on growth hormone and thyrotrophic hormone up to 40 days post-natal.