A study was undertaken on duck farming in a North-eastern part of India (Assam), representing almost all the agro-climatic zones. Five districts were selected, one from each agro-climatic zone except for the hill area. Twenty-five duck farmers from each district, a total of 125 in all, were selected on the basis of flock size. Results of the study in respect of socio-economic status of the farmer, demographic distribution, husbandry and feeding practice, production performance, incidence of diseases, mortality pattern and health protection programmes, marketing, finance and costs and returns from the flocks are highlighted.

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A total of 23 polymorphic microsatellite markers were used to evaluate genetic diversity and population structure in Assam Hill Goat (AHG). All the loci studied were polymorphic in nature. The number of observed alleles (N a ) detected ranged from 2 to 10 with an overall mean of 4.9±2.220. A total of 114 alleles were observed across all the loci. The effective number of alleles (N e ) ranged from 1.035 to 7.127 with a mean of 2.68±1.590. The allele frequency ranged from 0.013 to 0.982. The overall mean observed (H O ) and expected (H e ) heterozygosity were 0.43 and 0.48 respectively and this population was in Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium at most of the loci studied. The overall mean of within-population inbreeding estimate (F IS ) was 0.085. The population was stable with respect to size and was non-bottlenecked. The observed normal L-shaped curve indicated no mode shift in the population.

The present investigation was undertaken to study the physical and morphometric characteristics in indigenous cattle of Assam. The data pertain to 339 indigenous cattle of different categories. The physical characteristics included colour pattern of body coat, muzzle, tail switch, hoof and horn. Body length, height at wither, heart girth, pouch girth, length of tail, switch, neck, ear and head were taken up for morphometric characterization. The main body coat colour of indigenous cattle was brown (31.18%) followed by white (28.53%), fawn (15.29%), grey (13.53%), black (4.41%) and mixed (7.06%). The prominent colour of tail switch was black (74.53%). Most of animals had black muzzle (86.47%), black hooves (84.71%) and black horn (100%). Morphometric characteristics data obtained were classified according to location, age group and sex of the animal. The means for body length, height at wither, heart girth, pouch girth, length of tail, switch, neck, ear and head were 83.668�0.590, 91.942�0.55, 113.146�0.738, 121.181�0.761, 54.196�0.527, 26.098�0.186, 32.705�0.166, 18.131�0.111 and 35.035�0.195 cm respectively. Age and sex had significant effect on all the morphometric characters however, location effect was non significant. The indigenous cattle of Assam are comparatively smaller in size than most of the recognized breeds of cattle however coat colour showed sizeable variation. The data generated for indigenous cattle of Assam would be useful to characterize them.

Assam hill goat (Capra hircus) is a prolific local goat in India. bone morphogenetic protein receptor (BMPR1B) gene was studied as a candidate gene for the prolificacy of goats. The objective of the present study was to detect the incidence of mutation in the exonic region of BMPR1B gene of Assam hill goat. Total 90 blood samples were collected randomly from different parts of Assam and genomic DNA were extracted using phenol-chloroform method. The quantity and quality of extracted DNA was examined by spectrophotometry and gel electrophoresis, respectively. PCR amplicon showed a product of 140 bp fragment of BMPR1B gene. The purified product upon digestion with AvaII showed monomorphic banding pattern and revealed wild type alleles with AA genotype. Nucleotide sequencing showed one new mutation 773 (G→C) which is found to be unique in Assam hill goat. Construction of tree at nucleotide level generates from the present experiment lies in common cluster which differs from the other breeds of goat. The analysis of polymorphism for BMPR1B in Assam hill goat indicates that the genetic factor responsible for prolificacy or multiple kidding rates is not related to the reported mutated alleles of BMPR1B gene. Therefore, attempts to be made to detect other SNPs for BMPR1B gene or otherwise effort should be made towards other fecundity gene which might be responsible for the prolificacy of Assam hill goat.