​A Study on the Housing and Feeding Management Practices Followed by Rural Milk Producers of Telangana State

An investigation was carried out to study the housing and feeding management practices followed by the dairy farmers in five districts of Telangana state. From each district one mandal and from each mandal five villages were selected. The data was collected from 150 farmers through personal interview utilizing a schedule developed for the purpose. It was observed that most of the dairy farmers (59.33%) had medium herd size and 59.33% of farmers housed their animals beside their houses while 14.67% and 26% of the farmers housed the animals in a separate shed and below the shade of tree, respectively. Most of the animal sheds (66%) in the study area had mud flooring. Majority of farmers (52%) were not taking any measures to protect animals from extreme heat in summer. Grazing and group feeding were most commonly practised except in Rangareddy district where most of farmers (56.67%) followed individual feeding. Majority of the farmers from Medak (50%) and Mahaboobnagar (60%) districts were following one time feeding of their animals, whereas, most farmers from Vikarabad (66.67%) fed two times in a day. In Rangareddy and Nalgonda, majority (66.67% and 63.33%) of the farmers were offering feed three times. Most of the farmers were producing fodder by themselves in Vikarabad, Medak, Nalgonda and Mahaboobnagar districts and their percentages were 66.67%, 63.33% 93.33% and 86.67%, respectively. Most of the farmers of Rangareddy district were procuring fodder from outside.