Untitled - Faculdade de Medicina Veterinária e Zootecnia - Unesp

Figure 2. Effect of parity on lactation curve in Mediterranean Italian breed (Catillo et al., 2002).
(◆ = < 3 years; < age 4 years; ▲ = < age 5 years; x = < age 6 years).
Lactation curves were different for the first and later parities with lactations of different
duration also in Nili-Ravi buffaloes (Khan and Chaudry, 2000), who found a lactation length of
about 289 days for an average milk yield of 1 984 kg as about 59% of the lactations had length
shorter than the standard lactation of a 10 months. The same Authors found different lactation
curves according the parities (figure 3, Khan and Chaudhry, 2001). These Authors found 10% of
atypical lactations, with the first calves having the highest frequency.
Figure 3. Effect of parity on lactation curve in Nili-Ravi breed (Khan and Chaudhry, 2001).
According Penchev et al. (2011), the highest peak yield belongs to the buffaloes with the
highest calving age, by 0.719 kg higher as compared with the earliest calvers (figure 4). In the latest
age at calving the relative decline from second to third months is twice faster as compared with the