Drought is an extreme and frequent event in the northwest region of Bangladesh and it adversely affects the livelihood of the farming community. Identifying the coping strategies that farmers use in the face of drought is crucial in order to understand how farmers minimize the effects of drought on their production, especially in the face of climatic changes that may impact the occurrence of extreme weather events. The purpose of this study was to assess farmers' coping strategies for droughts by identifying which strategies are used and the influencing factors. A mixed methods approach using qualitative and quantitative data was employed. Preliminary data were collected using structured interviews and focus group discussions in which the findings were triangulated in order to design a questionnaire. The study respondents were 100 farmers operating in northwest Bangladesh. The findings were analyzed using descriptive statistics, coefficient of correlation, multiple linear and step-wise regressions. The results reveal that the respondents have limited drought coping strategies, even though the region is prone to frequent droughts. Among the fourteen identified drought coping strategies, the use of deep tube wells for irrigation water was the most widely reported and the farmers perceived it as the most important coping strategy. Shallow tube wells closely followed as the second most commonly used coping strategy reported by the respondents. Among the identified coping strategies, the least practiced was the use of treadle pumps. The findings from the study showed that age, education, farm size, annual family income, extension media contact, and organization participation were significantly associated with the choice of coping strategy that the farmers employed. Additionally, farm size, age, and education were identified as influential factors that affected the farmers' choice of which drought coping strategies to use. The study identified important issues for policy makers engaged with governmental programs that aim to enhance the farmers' drought coping mechanisms. The methods employed and the results of this study could be usefully applied in other districts of Bangladesh, or other areas of the world suffering from the negative effects of drought on agricultural production.

Problem statement: Need of agricultural information is the basic necessity for the farmers as it plays a pivotal role in enlightening them, raising their level of knowledge and eventually help in their decision making process regarding farming activities. Extension workers with their extension services are doing this noble work. PROSHIKA a renowned NGO in Bangladesh is promoting organic agriculture among the smallholders since 1978. However, its expansion in Bangladesh has remained far behind the expected level that raised the issue about the effectiveness of the organic agriculture extension (from hereafter, OAE) program of PROSHIKA. Thus, the study was undertaken to identify the determinants influencing the effectiveness of PROSHIKA's OAE program in improving the livelihood of the smallholder organic farmers in Bangladesh. Additionally the study was attempted to learn the farmers' perception about this OAE program as well as the Extension Workers (EW). Approach: Data for the analysis were sourced from 90 small holder organic farmers of Madhupur subdistrict those are group members of PROSHIKA. Results: The results of the study showed that the majority (62%) of the respondent farmers had a good perception about the effectiveness of PROSHIKA's OAE services in their livelihood improvement. While, 50% of respondent farmers felt that the extension workers of PROSHIKA are credible and about 52% of the respondent farmers had a better perception about the quality of the extension workers. The result of the logit regression identified that credibility of the extension workers, frequency of contact with extension workers, varieties of extension services received by the farmers and farmers' education had significant relationship with effectiveness of the extension services. Conclusion/Recommendations: Thus it can be concluded that if PROSHIKA give emphasis on credibility improvement of their extension workers and ensure more frequent visits of the extension workers with farmers then the effectiveness of their extension services will be improved and eventually help in rapid expansion of organic farming in Bangladesh.

A retrospective-epidemiological study of cattle diseases/disorders was conducted at Baghabari Milking zone of Bangladesh starting from June 2008 to May 2012. Out of 22066 cases, 73.95% and 17.16% diseases/disorders were recorded in cows and calves respectively. About 58.42%, 23.56% 12.48% and 5.54% cases were general and systemic, infectious, production and reproductive and surgical diseases/disorders respectively. The most common general and systemic diseases/disorders were fever (17.91%), anorexia (17.55%) and weakness (14.71%). Among infectious diseases, 78.2%, 7.02% and 6.32% respectively were mastitis, FMD and black quarter. The predominant production and reproductive diseases were milk fever (33.48%), repeat breeder (17.10%), retained placenta (14.27%), metritis (13.11) and anestrous (11.44%). The most common surgical disorders were navel ill (46.9%), wound (20.19%), abscess (8.99%) and urolithiasis (8.67%). Statistically significant variation of diseases in different seasons was also noted. We recommend for undertaking research focusing on the causes of fever, anorexia and weakness as they were the most predominant general and systemic disorders of cattle. Control measure should be initiated to reduce the burden of mastitis, repeat breeder, retained placenta and anestrous which were most common production and reproductive diseases in the study area. A case control study may help to reveal the factors responsible for such a high level of occurrence of navel ill in calves. This study generated information which is valuable not only for the clinicians, researchers, animal health companies and policy planners but also for the academicians to update veterinary curricula.

Objective: Hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) was used for the activation of lactoperoxidase system on preservation of milk. Materials and methods: Milk samples were collected from Bangladesh Agricultural University dairy farm. The collected milk samples were added with 0.02, 0.04, 0.06, 0.08, 0.10, 0.12 and 0.14% of 10% H2O2 along with control one. All milk samples were kept at room temperature (28-31 0 C). Flavor, clot on boiling (COB), acidity %, and methylene blue reduction (MBR) test were observed every one hour interval. Results: The milk samples were acceptable in terms of flavor up to 18 h at 0.14% H2O2. Similarly, this milk sample took maximum time (19 h) to give COB positive test. Acidity % was within normal range for 0.02, 0.04, 0.06, 0.08, 0.10, 0.12 and 0.14% H2O2 treated milk samples up to 8,9,11,12,12,14,17 and 18 h, respectively. Significant difference (P<0.01) was found among the levels of H2O2 in acidity development at every observation hour except 0 hour. In MBR test, control sample was decolorized at 7 h and H2O2 treated milk samples were decolorized after 8 to 13 h depending on the level of added H2O2. Conclusion: Based on the results, it may be recommended that 0.14% H2O2 is suitable to extend the milk shelf-life where milk cooling facilities are not available.

Six indigenous Bangladeshi Garole sheep (Ovis aries) (BW: 8±0.5 kg; Age: 1yr) were divided into two groups using a randomized block design to investigate the effect of total mixed ration (TMR) pellet feeding on growth parameter, blood metabolomics, carcass and meat characteristics. Control diet was composed of road side grass, rice straw, wheat bran, mustard oil cake, molasses, common salt which considered as loose total mixed ration (L-TMR) and treatment diet was pelleted form of L-TMR (P-TMR).In both the dietary treatments the animals were fed at 1.5 times of maintenance energy and protein requirement. P-TMR revealed a positive impact (p < 0.05) on live weight gain and feed conversion ratio than L-TMR. Total digestible nutrients (TDN) and digestible crude fibre (DCF) was significantly higher (p < 0.05) in P-TMR group whereas there was no significant difference (p < 0.05) in other digestible nutrients as well as plasma metabolites like plasma glucose, triglyceride, total cholesterol, HDL-cholesterol and LDL- cholesterol concentration between two dietary group. Dressing percentage and eye muscle area was significantly higher (p < 0.05) in P-TMR group but no significant difference was found between dietary treatments in term of disposition of body fat, proximate composition of mutton, all the sensory parameters except tenderness and overall acceptability. So, it could be concluded that, the P-TMR might be fed to sheep for better growth performance and higher meat production rather than production of functional mutton.Progressive Agriculture 28 (3): 222-229, 2017