Current Issue : July - September Volume : 2015 Issue Number : 3 Articles : 5 Articles
Agriculture has straight and indirect contribution to boost the economy of Pakistan.wheat and paddy are among the\nmajor rotational crops of Pakistan. The straw management in combine harvested in wheat fields is a major problem. In the\npast the residual wheat straw in convectional harvesting was burnt in the field which resulted lossesof 80% of Nitrogen, 25%\nP, 21% K and 4% to 60% S.To overcome this problem, locally available wheat straw chopper is used for cutting and\ncollecting the wheat straw left behind the combine harvesters. These locally developedwheat straw choppers are heavy in\nweight having lowermachine efficiency. A wheat straw chopper has beenmodified using locally available materials making it\nlight weight and more efficient. The performance evaluation of wheat straw chopper has been carried out in the field and\nfurther improvements have been incorporated to increase its field efficiency. The modified wheat straw chopper has been\ntested for its performance at Chakra Farms of the University of Agriculture, Faisalabad during the wheat harvesting season.\nThe experiment was consisted of factorial completely randomized design. Three wheat varieties V1 (Sehar-2006), V2 (Lasani)\nand V3 (Faisalabad-2008) were selected in which modified wheat straw chopper was operated at two different tractor forward\nspeeds S1 (1.77 km/h) and S2(2.42 km/h) and at two different levels of moisture contents M1(moisture at the same day of\ncombining), M2(moisture after one day of combining). Results showed that wheat straw yield (kg ha-1) for V1, V2 and V3\nwas found to be 1425, 1118 and 1179 kg/ha respectively. Effect of moisture on wheat straw yield (kg/ha) was found to be\nsignificant, and higher wheat straw yield (kg/ha) was found to be at moisture content level M1.The wheat straw yield and\nefficiency of the wheat straw chopper was found to be higher at S1(1.77 km/h) which is for wheat variety V1 and 67.96%\nrespectively.The average fuel consumption was found to be 9.3 L/ha.Breakeven point of the wheat straw chopper was\noccurred at 225 hours of use....
Natural products are more preferred by consumers now-a-days over the synthetic ones. Therefore a natural fruit\ncoating was developed from natural ingredients (shellac, rosin, gum arabic, water and ethanol from sugar industry) without\nammonia or morphine as an alternative to the synthetic coatings. So this research was devised to compare the effects of this\nnewly developed natural fruit coating (with 9% total solids) with those of synthetic one (polyethylene based ammonia\ncontaining wax with 21% total solids) on the postharvest quality of kinnow (Citrus reticulata Blanco) mandarins. The kinnow\nmandarins were either coated with natural or synthetic fruit coatings or were left uncoated and stored at 5 2�°C with 85-90%\nrelative humidity for 63 days with five replications for each treatment. The results showed that both fruit coatings\nsignificantly (p<0.05) delayed changes in physiological loss in weight, firmness, ascorbic acid and overall sensory quality\nduring the storage period as compared to uncoated fruits, while non-significant (p>0.05) changes in total soluble solids and\nfruit acidity were recorded for all the treatments. Furthermore the difference between natural and synthetic fruit coatings was\nnon-significant (p>0.05). Therefore, it could be suggested that the natural fruit coating is a good alternative of the synthetic\nfruit coating....
Assessment of marginality of milk for an existing buffalo to produce more milk above what she is currently producing is often done by veterinarians in farms or in buffalo research stations using conventional method which is a basically a complex and time consuming. In today's era of Smart phones, tablet PCs and Notebooks where a spreadsheet program in the form of Excel is readily accessible by most veterinarians, it should be possible to adapt the various laborious steps involved in the said method to a spreadsheet program. With a goal to simplify the calculation, in this article we have designed a spreadsheet program based on the steps involved in conventional method for assessment of marginality of milk, we have explored the possibility of adapting the conventional method to a spreadsheet. With this, the calculations happen automatically and they are reproducible in the form of a printout which can easily explain how the final figure was arrived....
Bovine lameness represents a major health problem for the dairy industry. High lameness accounts for tremendous economic loss. Traditionally, studies which placed a monetary value on the effect of lameness have calculated the costs at the herd level by using conventional method which is a basically a complex and time consuming. In today's era of smart phones, tablet PCs and notebooks where a spreadsheet program in the form of Excel [1] is readily accessible by most veterinarians, it should be possible to adapt the various laborious steps involved in the said method to a spreadsheet program. The objective of this study was to calculate the cost of lameness at the herd level. This model would provide a more informed decision making process in lameness management for maximal economic profitability. We made modifications to an existing conventional method and simulated the conventional model, by studying the effects of various factors i.e. incidence of lameness, milk loss and treatment cost....
Assessment of poultry feed formulations both for layer and broiler in poultry sheds to produce further more yield is often done by veterinarians in poultry sheds or in research stations using conventional method which is a basically a complex and time consuming. In today's era of Smart phones, tablet PCs and Notebooks where a spreadsheet program in the form of Excel is readily accessible by most veterinarians, it should be possible to adapt the various laborious steps involved in the said method to a spreadsheet program. With a goal to simplify the calculation, in this research a spreadsheet program based on the steps involved in conventional method for assessment of poultry feed formulations has been designed. The possibility of adapting the conventional method to a spreadsheet has been explored. With this, the calculations happen automatically and they are reproducible in the form of a printout which can easily explain how the final figure was arrived....
Loading....