The Department of Agriculture reported on Monday that a crossbred buffalo at its attached agency, the Philippine Carabao Center, reached a yield of 20 kilograms and maintained a daily yield of more than 15 kilograms for two months during its second trimester of lactation.

The DA-PCC said that the crossbred buffalo, identified as 7UP15001, born on 6 January 2015 at its institutional herd at the University of Los Baños, maintained an average daily milk yield of 12.9 kilograms during its last lactation.

Furthermore, it yielded a total of 3883.7 kilograms of milk over a 299-day lactation period, which was the highest milk yield ever recorded among its female buffaloes.

“7UP15001 has surpassed the typical lactation period of 265 days observed in dairy buffaloes within DA-PCC herds, which typically ranges from 200 to 369 days. Moreover, its milk production exceeds the 4.5 kg and 10 kg average milk yield per day per lactation for dairy buffalo and dairy cattle, respectively, during a 305-day lactation period under Philippine conditions,” said the DA-PCC.

“This crossbred stands as a testament to the concerted efforts of DA-PCC’s GIP, specifically focused on backcrossing to harness the genetic potential of carabaos for enhanced milk and meat production,” it continued, disclosing that the said buffalo has a genetic composition of 87.5 percent Bulgarian Murrah and 12.5 percent swamp buffalo.

The agency explained that the backcrossing approach involves mating purebred riverine buffaloes with native swamp buffaloes, or carabaos.

“The resulting offspring—crossbred carabaos—are bigger, meatier, and produce more milk than native carabaos, which can only provide an average of one to two liters of milk a day,” it said, noting that their backcrossing program follows a protocol of no-father-daughter mating to avoid inbreeding depression.

PCC’s National Coordinator of the Genetic Improvement Program, Dr. Ester Flores, said that the yield is a groundbreaking record, showcasing the program’s success.

“We are producing animals that can adapt to the tropical climate with little input and resource requirements. Our goal is to provide our farmers with the finest dairy carabao genetics through breeding,” she said.

The processes of selective breeding and genetic evaluation under Philippine conditions include the recording of pedigree and phenotype, maintenance of pedigree and performance database, genetic evaluation and progeny testing, cryobanking of frozen semen, and continuous backcrossing.

“Animals like 7UP15001 are the result of a long-term effort to produce better buffalo with higher productivity. It didn’t come over night; it’s a series of actions,” said Dr. Flores. “We cannot implement it without the sacrifice of the institutional herds using the semen of young bulls, recording the production of females, and doing it again from generation to generation.”