Retrospective study on mortality of goats due to alimentary system diseases in an organized farm

A twenty five years (1988-2012) retrospective study on mortality of goats due to alimentary system (AS) diseases was carried out in an organized farm of ICAR- Central Institute for Research on Goats, Makhdoom, Farah, Mathura (UP), India. Animals were reared under semi-intensive rearing system at the farm. The study was conducted regarding major causes of mortality, sex and age groups affected, type of AS ailments causing mortality and their association with seasonal variation. The study revealed that the AS diseases were the major cause of mortality in goats with kids and adult being almost equally affected. The mortality patterns were found similar in both the sexes in the given time period. Sex had significant association with different age groups and AS diseases in terms of mortality pattern. Overall, adult females suffered higher mortality than males due to intestinal diseases. On the basis of post-mortem and laboratory diagnosis, the maximum mortality percentage was due to enteritis (43.67%) followed by Johne's disease (22.98%), hemonchosis (10.04%), inanition (7.71%), gastrointestinal parasitism (5.00%), tympany (2.60%) and enterotoxaemia (2.50%). The deaths due to intestinal diseases (71.5%) were highest followed by gastro-intestinal parasitism (15.1%) and gastric diseases (11.9%). Hepato-billiary diseases (1.5%) were least responsible for mortality. Gastrointestinal parasitism and hepatobiliary diseases showed significant (at p < 0.01 and p < 0.05, respectively) association with seasons, the former causing 51.3% and latter 45.2% mortality during rainy season.