Solvent Extraction Behaviour of Lanthanides with 1-Phenyl-3-methyl-4-benzoyl-5-pyrazolone

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Grasslands in India: Problems and Perspectives for Sustaining Livestock and Rural Livelihood

In India, grazing-based livestock husbandry plays an important role in the rural economy as around 50% of these animals depend on grazing. Pasturelands over an area of 12 million ha constitute the main grazing resources that are available. Temperate/alpine pastures are spread across altitudes higher than 2000 m in eastern and Western Himalayas including the Jammu & Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh, Uttaranchal, West Bengal Arunachal Pradesh and Sikkim states. In Himachal Pradesh, Jammu & Kashmir, Meghalaya, Nagaland and Arunachal Pradesh,the grazing land availability is as high as 70 %. The area of pasture lands is lower in Himachal Pradesh (36.4%), Sikkim (13.3%), Karnataka (6.5%), Madhya Pradesh (6.3%), Rajasthan (5.4%), Maharashtra (5.1%), and Gujarat (4.5%), where cropping intensities are higher. Nearly 30 pastoral communities in hilly or arid/semi-arid regions in northern and western parts of India, as well as 20 in temperate/hilly regions, depend on grazing-based livestock production. Based on their migratory habits, the nomadic tribes are classified into 4 groups, viz., (1) total nomadism; (2) semi-nomadism; (3) transhumance; and (4) partial nomadism. Due to overgrazing coupled with poor management and care, these grazing land have deteriorated to a large extent and they need amelioration or rehabilitation. Technologies have been developed, refined and tested in various research and academic institutions. These technologies need to be implemented on a large scale in different parts of the country for augmenting forage resources, enhancing milk production and sustaining livelihood options in eco-friendly manner

Breeding Strategies to Improve Fodder Legumes with Special Emphasis on Clover and Medics

In India, Forage has a unique integration of agriculture and animal industry in diversified rich cultural environment. Greater part of rural economy in India relies much upon mixed farming system, a well-knit combination of crop production and livestock rearing. In India, grazing-based livestock husbandry plays an important role in the rural economy as around 50% of animals depend on grazing. Pasturelands over an area of 12 Mha constitute the main grazing resources that are available. Nearly 30 pastoral communities in hilly or arid/semi-arid regions in northern and western parts of India, depend on grazing-based livestock production. Nomadic pastoralism, a traditional form of human-livestock-grassland interaction, is still predominant in the drylands of western India, the Deccan Plateau, and in the mountainous reaches of the Himalayas. (Roy and Singh, 2013)

Productivity of Grasses in Association with \u3cem\u3eHardwickia binata\u3c/em\u3e under Rainfed Conditions

Adoption of silvipasture system on wastelands offers, without impairing the growth of trees, an extra yield of grass during monsoon season and top feed during summer seasons. The leaf fodder from the hardy trees and shrubs serve as an insurance against fodder scarcity during drought to the livestock. In view of this the present study was carried out to assess the productivity of different grasses in association with Hardwickia binata under moisture conservation practices under rainfed condition

Conservation of Grassland Plant Genetic Resources through People Participation

Agrobiodiversity provides the foundation of all food and feed production. Hence, need of the time is to collect, evaluate and utilize the biodiversity globally available. Indian sub-continent is one of the world’s mega centers of crop origins. India possesses 166 species of agri-horticultural crops and 324 species of wild relatives. India is reported to have five grass covers identified. There have been almost nil human interference in terms of selection pressure; hence, the biodiversity is well conserved in these grazing lands. There is need of a system approach to understanding biodiversity that moves significantly beyond taxonomy and species observations. In addition to forage value, many grasses hold the medicinal value. Duplication in the collected germplasm is a serious issue. Hence, molecular tools need to be employed. Indian Grassland and Fodder Research Institute, Jhansi is maintaining \u3e 8500 germplasm of many fodder crops. For thousands of years farmers have been domesticating plant species thereby developing a wide range of crop varieties adapted to specific needs and environmental conditions and their rights have been protected through Indian Plant Variety Protection and Farmer’s Right Act. The use of diverse species and varieties by farmers enhances their adaptability and resilience capacity to changing environmental and economic conditions. Farmers in Manipur are conserving the biodiversity of the state by farming around 100 traditional varieties of paddy and rare medicinal plants. Old grasslands are very good place of conservation. Southern India forms the important genetic resource centre for many grass crops which includes cereals, millets, sugarcane, lemon grass, ginger grass etc. farmers in Maharastra are also conserving PGR and maintaining Biodiversity Register of the grassland species under guidance of Samvedana. “Community based conservation” and “peoples’ participation” have become part of the conventional rhetoric. Wealth of segregating breeding population also need to be conserved. The grasses or other species in grasslands are growing in highly diverse and harsh condition. These are harbouring genes for tolerance to many abiotic stresses such as light, heat and salinity/alkalinity. Hence, this wide variability, if conserved suitably, can prove to be resource to address climate change issue

Development of New, High Yielding Tropical Grass Varieties for Increasing Productivity of Semi-Arid Grasslands in India

Indian agriculture has traditionally been a mixed farming system since ancient times with integration of arable crops and livestock. It provides employment and livelihood to 70% of the rural population. Livestock are predominantly cattle and small ruminants that graze extensively on rangelands/pasturelands and common property resources (CPRs). CPRs occupy approximately 54 million ha area including permanent pastures in the alpine and temperate parts as well as seasonal grazing lands and wastelands. The productivity and carrying capacity of tropical degraded grasslands is very low, the average carrying capacity being 1.0, 0.7, 0.7 Adult Cattle Unit (ACU)/ha in semi-arid, arid and hill areas respectively. One of the options to increase livestock productivity is to grow more pasture by introducing higher yielding tropical grass varieties. Sehima nervosum, Heteropogon contortus and Chrysopogon fulvus are major species components of semi-arid tropical grasslands. These peren-nial grasses dominate two of the five major grassland covers, viz. Sehima-Dichanthium cover and Dichanthium-Lasiurus-Cenchrus cover

Forage from Trees and Grasses of Silvipasture System in Degraded Land of Semiarid India

Rainfed agro-ecosystem has a distinct place in Indian Agriculture, occupying 67% of the cultivated area and supporting 65% of the livestock population (Venkateswarlu, 2005). The silvipasture systems involving suitable multi-purpose trees specially fodder trees and range grass species provide resilience by ensuring continued and multiple outputs such as, forage, fuelwood, fodder, fibre and industrial raw material, besides other positive environmental effects. Incorporation of fodder trees with grasses is perceived as a climate change-resilient cropping system for farmers linking climate change mitigation with adaptation (Mbow et al., 2014). The synergies of tree-grass association need to be explored and exploited by evaluating different fodder tree species with combination of grass species under degraded land and climatic condition. In many low input agro-ecosystems grasses are intercropped with legumes since legumes have an importance as a primary source of nitrogen (Thomsen and Haugaard-Nielsen, 2008). This study was planned to develop a silvipasture system with suitable tree and grass species on degraded land of semi arid condition to ensure the availability of quality fodder round the year

Transcriptome Analysis of Differentially Expressed Genes at Pre-Meiotic Developmental Stage in Pennisetum Hybrids with Contrasting Modes of Reproduction

Apomixis is an asexual reproduction through seeds where embryo develops without meiosis and fertilization. It is widely distributed throughout plant kingdom, but is more prevalent in families like Asteraceae, Rosaceae and Poaceae (Carman, 1997). This trait is highly desirable for fixing heterosis in F1 hybrids with significant implications for crop improvement (Dwivedi et al., 2007). Therefore it is necessary to unravel the molecular and genetic basis of apomixis to tap its potential. Pennisetum is an important genus of the Poaceae family which contains a wide range of species exhibiting wide variability in morphological, molecular, and reproductive traits (Jauhar, 1998). It includes many apomictic wild relatives of cultivated pearl millet (Pennisetum glaucum), some of them used extensively for introgression and molecular studies on apomixis, such as P. squamulatum, P. ciliare, and P. orientale (Ozias-Akins and Van Dijk, 2007; Kaushal et al., 2010). In order to identify putative genes involved in expression of apomixis, the genes showing differential expression across sexual and apomictic genotypes may be identified and characterized. A variety of methods are available for such molecular differential screening. These include differential display, fingerprinting techniques like cDNA AFLP, Subtractive hybridization, Micro array and Gene Chip technologies. These methods are employed for different purposes based on their convenience, sensitivity, automation and throughput. Texa with contrasting modes of reproduction are resources to identify genes involved in apomixis phenomenon. Broadly, the differentiation in reproduction pathway between apomictic and sexual lines is at three steps viz. pre-meiotic (including genes involved in preparing of ovule to enter into apomeiotic pathway), meiotic (genes involved in apomeiosis and embryo-sac development) and post-meiotic (genes involved in embryo-sac maturation and preparing for parthenogenesis). The present study was aimed to carry out a comprehensive transcriptome survey to identify differentially expressed transcripts in ovules of aposporous Pennisetum hybrid during the pre-meiotic stage of apomictic reproduction

Quality Seed Production of Range Grasses--A Major Constraint in Revitalising Tropical Pastures

Only 4% of India’s geographical area of 326.82 M ha is under pastures. Socioeconomic and ecological consequ-ences of land degradation are affecting 85 M ha of rangelands/grasslands. To provide sufficient milk for the ever-growing population, current milk production of 128 M t must increase to 160 M t by 2020. To make this possible, an additional 825 M t of green fodder is required. Increasing the area producing green fodder is difficult because of severe competition from food crops. Revitalising the denuded grasslands is the most plausible means for improving the availability of green fodder. This needs mission mode programs with participation of the people