Cattle as capital

Livestock have been seen either as a source of subsistence or as commodities in a process of capital accumulation. Is the association of cattle with capital just a poetic metaphor or the grounds for a serious analysis of third world herding communities? Economists are divided between an orthodox notion of capital as physical equipment and a Marxist emphasis on social relations dominated by money. Nevertheless, some anthropologists assert that herders should be conceptualised as capitalists. The key elements in the Western folk concept of capital are: increase, money, physical stock and preoccupation with future time. Despite the plausible link between herding and some of these ideas, we conclude that, as an analytical category, ‘capital’ is too loaded and diffuse for fruitful application to the analysis of pastoralist production.     

Oxytetragyclines in Cattle

Pharmacokinetics of oxytetracycline (OTC) were studied in 4 cows after administration of either a conventional (OTC-C) or a long-acting (OTC-LA) preparation. After intravenous administration of OTG-G the elimination half-life for OTG was found to be 6 h. Intramuscular injection of OTC-C and OTC-LA resulted in almost identical plasma concentrations of OTC with peak values after 6–8 h. For both preparations the bioavailability after i.m. administration was 100 % and about 60 % of the dose was excreted in the urine during the first week. Plasma concentrations above 0.5 μg/ml were with both preparations maintained for approximately 60 h, indicating no retard effect of OTC-LA as compared to OTC-C.     

Embryo Transplantation in Cattle

Fourteen true repeat breeders with entirely normal oestrous cyclicity more than 1 year after calving and 14 control donor cows were superovulated with PMSG (2000 i.u.) and flushed non-surgically 6–8 days after the superovulatory heat. The superovulatory response was identical for the 2 groups such as assessed by the number of corpora lutea (9.4 ± 1.8 C.L. per repeat breeder and 9.1 ± 1.5 per control cow), occurrence of ovarian overstimulation (polycysts), presence of a non-countable amount of corpora lutea, negative outcome of the flushings and the number of recovered embryos (5.8 ± 1.0 embryos per repeat breeder and 6.0 ± 1.8 embryos per control cow). The most pronounced difference between the 2 categories of animals was related to the fertilization rate of embryos. In the repeat breeder group only 2.4 embryos per cow or 41 % were fertilized, whereas the control animals attained a fertilization rate of 4.9 embryos or 82 %. Since most factors liable to interfere with the fertilization process were identical for both groups (age, breed, nutritional and management conditions, semen quality, dose, AI-technician e.g.), it is believed that intraovarian, follicular, or follicular-dynamic conditions were responsible for producing a high proportion of non-fertilizable oocytes.     

Embryo Transplantation in Cattle

Previous attempts to transfer embryos non-surgically to heifers have been rather discouraging. The present experiment describes a simple non-surgical technique where the 6½–7½ -day old embryo is placed in a 0.25 ml ministraw, fitted into a common insemination gun and transferred cervically to synchronized lactating dairy cows. Thirty-two viable embryos were transferred to the middle part of the uterine horn ipsilateral to the ovary containing the corpus luteum. It was easy to pass the cervix, and most embryos could be deposited in the horn within 1 or 2 min. Eighteen animals were diagnosed pregnant (56% ). It is conceivable that the easy atraumatic transfers and good management (feeding, oestrus control) of the recipients contributed to the high pregnancy rate.