eChapters

India is home to an enormous number of buffalo. According to the 20th Livestock Census, more than 109 million buffaloes, or more than 56% of the world’s population, are living in India. With 20 recognized breeds, it also has a very diverse collection of buffalo genetics. One of the most well-known buffalo breeds in the world, the Murrah, is also found in India. The buffalo is a versatile animal that can be used for milk, meat, and draught. India is the world leader in this industry, producing 76% of the world’s buffalo milk.

Dietary fat, which is not degraded in upper part of digestive tract (rumen) of animal, but gets digested in lower alimentary tract is known as bypass fat. Rumen protected fat is another name for this bypass fat. Immediately following calving, dairy animals lose a significant amount of energy through milk, although their feed intake is decreased. Animals continue to have negative energy balances as a result.

By minimizing the harsh climate effects like heat, cold and rain, it is crucial to offer the proper circumstances for raising dairy cows in the tropics. Stress can be reduced through the design of the farm and the dwelling. Controlling the environment lowers the risk of stress and disease, improves management, and increases milk production.

The cradle-to-grave dairy supply chain includes a number of operations that result in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions related to milk production. These activities broadly include the use of agricultural inputs like fertilizers, fossil fuel for the production of animal feed and fodder, processing concentrates in cattle feed plants, enteric fermentation, manure management, and post farm gate activities like processing milk at dairy cooperative societies, milk unions, its conversion into different milk products, and their distribution through retail supply chains.

In may cases, it becomes necessary to send the cells from one laboratory to another laboratory within or outside the country. The ideal method is to fill the flask containing cells at log/exponential phase with growth medium, tightly close the cap, seal it with parafilm and tape and pack it properly with polythene containing tissue paper and cotton. The tissue paper and cotton is used to soak the medium in case of accidental breakage. The polythene containing tissue culture flask having the adherent cell sheet should again be packed with thick paper. Finally, it is to be kept in a wooden/metal box or container.

Bougainvillea plants are native of South America from Brazil west to Peru and south to southern Argentina (Chubut Province). A native to coastal Brazil, the bougainvillea was discovered in 1768 in Rio de Janeiro by French naturalist Dr. Philibert Commerçon (also sometimes spelled Commerson). The plant is named after his close friend and ship’s admiral Louis-Antoine de Bougainville, who commanded the ship La Boudeuse that sailed around the world between 1766-1769, and in which Commerçon was a passenger. Twenty years after Commerçon’s discovery, it was first published as ‘Buginvillea’ in Genera Plantarum by A.L. de Jusseau in 1789. The genus was subsequently spelt in several ways until it was finally corrected to ‘Bougainvillea’ in the Index Kewensis in the 1930s. Originally, B. spectabilis and B. glabra were hardly differentiated until the mid 1980s when botanists recognized them to be totally distinct species. Bougainvillea spectabilis Willd., a native of Brazil reported to be found wild in all provinces of that large country (Taillemite 1977, Forzza 2010). The oldest herbarium specimens of Bougainvillea spectabilis Willd. were collected during the brief stop of the Étoile in Rio de Janeiro. Two are kept in the General Herbarium of the Muséum National d’Histoire Naturelle in Paris (P 00169376, images in Monnier et al. 1993 : 176 and Jolinon 2004 : 79; P 00307018), and two in the Jussieu Herbarium conserved in the same institution (PJuss.; IDC 6206, No. 

Bougainvilleas are widely grown in India for multipurpose uses.  There are numerous varieties and cultivars that are important from floriculture point of view. Bougainvillea profusely flowers almost all the year round except in rainy season and very severe winter. It has earned a pride place in the floriculture and landscaping due to its variegated foliage and colourful bracts. Bougainvillea belongs to the family Nyctaginacea and in the tribe Mirabileae. It is the only genus in the monotypic subtribe Bougainvilleineae (Gills 1976, Hammad 2009). The first generic name as Bouginvillea was published by A.L. de Jussieu (1789) in his work ‘Garden Plantarum’. The spelling of the generic name subsequently changed about half a dozen times. Finally as per International Code of Botanical Nomenclature, it was spelt as Bougainvillea as used by Spachs (1841) and published in the Index Kewensis (Suppl. 9 : 1931-1935; c.f. Sharma 1996). Heimerl (1900) recognized 10 species, three of which (B. spectabilis Wild., B. glabra Choisy and B. peruviana Humb. and Bonp.)

ABSTRACT

Bats: A colony of 500 insectivorous bats of Hipposideros speoris inhabited a natural cave in Madurai (9^O58’ N. lat; 78^O10’ E long). At a depth of 40 m, the cave experiences a constant temperature of 27 + 0.1^OC, 95 % relative humidity and absolute and perpetual darkness. Therefore there were no day/night cues. Yet all the members of the bat colony flew out 10 to 15 min. after sunset as though they knew the time of sunset. Recorded flight and rest experiments in flight activity cages and a hand-wound Thermohygrograph drum 40 m from the cave mouth over periods of 50 days revealed that the free-flying conspecific bats were socially synchronizing the activity patterns of the three captive bats. Bats were telling other bats time.

Mice : In the field mouse, Mus booduga the mother conveys information of day and night to her pups by means of her presence and absence (PA) cycles. Her presence meant day and absence denoted night. We named this phenomenon maternal entrainment. Such entrainment of the time sense of the pups was possible if in every cycle the mother was presented for a minimum of 8 hr but not exceeding 16 hr. Therefore 8 hr and 16 hr describe the limits of maternal entrainment.

ABSTRACT

Insect societies such as those of ants, bees, wasps and termites are characterized by reproductive division of labour and cooperative brood care. Thus these societies consist of one or a smallnumber of reproductives (usually only queens but also kings in the case of termites) and a large number of sterile or nearly sterile workers

ABSTRACT

Malabar Spiny Dormouse (Platacanthomys lasiurus), the endemic rodent found in the Western Ghats of South India was studied in the Peppara Wildlife Sanctuary, Thiruvananthapuram District, Kerala, to determine the status, distribution, food and feeding of the species.

ABSTRACT

Science essentially involves confronting our ‘models’ of nature, against data from the real world, in a continuous effort to refine our knowledge of the system under study. Scientific monitoring of animal populations is therefore best viewed in the context of questions such as why monitor, what to monitor and how to monitor.

ABSTRACT

Social primates appear to be knowledgeable about one another’s behaviour to different extents. But do they know as much about one another’s beliefs and intentions? Are they adept at recognizing the similarities and differences between their own and others’ states of mind?

ABSTRACT

Male crickets use acoustic signals for long-distance mate attraction. Each cricket species has a unique calling song, used by females to recognize and localize conspecific males. Field cricket songs have wavelengths of several centimeters, which pose a difficult problem for these small animals in terms of localizing males, particularly in choruses. The chorus structure in terms of spacing, call intensity and timing, are important determinants both of the ability of males to synchronise their calls and of female mate-finding strategies.

ABSTRACT

Ethology, the biology of behaviour has been a fascinating area of biological investigations during past few decades. In recent past the information gathered by reputed ethologists on social behaviour of insects, fishes, birds and human beings are very helpful in the application of these principles for the welfare of the humanity as well as for the environmental sustainability. Ethology differs from the study of Animal Behavior, in that animal behaviorists generally are interested in learned behaviors while ethologists concentrate on innate behaviors.

ABSTRACT

Insects are considered the most successful in the animal kingdom. Many factors contribute to their success. One major factor that operates strikingly is the economy and optimal use of energy. One can give several examples taking the life of a single insect

ABSTRACT

The Indian false vampire bat, Megaderma lyra detects and captures prey (e.g. frogs) mainly by listening to the rustling sounds that are created when the prey is on ground. In addition, echolocation and vision are also involved. Mothers of M. lyra take meticulous care of their young. At the age of about seven weeks, juveniles exhibit gleaning flights. Among eight mother-young pairs, four young (group A) began to capture frogs at the age of 62 days

ABSTRACT

The Indian short-nosed fruit bat, Cynopterus sphinx is one among the three paleotropical species known to make tents. Once a tent is made, male typically defends it against other competing males and also defends the females who join his tent.

ABSTRACT

Folivorous bats consume flowers and fruits, effecting seed dispersal and pollination. Adaptation of plants according to the type of pollinator is called pollination syndrome. Some of the adaptations of bat-pollinated syndromes are nocturnal anthesis

ABSTRACT

The coconut eriophyid mite, Aceria guerreronis Keifer is a serious pest of coconut in Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Orissa, West Bengal, Maharashtra and Gujarat. The mites reside underneath the perianth of nuts and feed on the soft meristematic tissues of the young nuts. Their feeding damage is evident as scars on the surface of the older nuts. The damage results in reduction in size of nut and increases labour for dehusking the nuts.

ABSTRACT

Queens of 4 post-emergence colonies of primitively eusocial wasp, Ropalidia marginata were observed for their propensity to acquire and handle foraged material on naturally occurring free foraging nest. The queens were inclined to acquire pulp loads than food loads.