Livestock husbandry is essential for Indonesia. This study reviews cattle characteristics and husbandry methods in the country with special interest in describing the importance of indigenous breeds of cattle. As a conclusion, the Bali cattle ought to be considered the most suitable indigenous cattle breed for the low-input, high stress production system still practised by millions of families in Indonesia.

The present study reports the phenotypic variation of body weight and body size, the genetic variation of D-loop of mtDNA and microsatellite DNA allele in Aceh cattle in Indonesia within the frame of the design of a conservation programme for this indigenous species. Aceh cattle differ from Bali, Madura, Java-Ongole and Pesisir cattle, but its ancestry relates it closest to Pesisir, thus adding more information to its entry from the Indian sub-continent.

The purpose of this study was to know productivity and repeatability of local pigeon. Data were collected from 124 birds that reared under intensive management. The results showed that artificial pair was 100% and polygamy was 16% (n=62 pair of pigeon). The ration of local pigeon consisting of 50% corn+50% of commercial feed for starter broiler chicken can be applied in field. The average of egg production was 1.8 eggs/pair/period, egg weight was 17.7 g, fertility was 96.6%, hatching rate was 77%, embryo mortality rate was 23%, interval period from laying to hatching and suckling was 51 days, 31.4 days with hatching, and 17.6 days without hatching and suckling. The day old pigeon weight ranged 10.9-16.2 g. Repeatability value of productive traits was high, in which egg weight was 0.64 and day old pigeon weight was 0.737. Repeatability of reproductive traits was low, that was fertility and hatchability was 0.12 and 0.048, respectively). The squab weight increased from week 0 to 4, then decreased in the week 5. The growth rate was highest at the week 1, then decreased from the week 2 to 5 with the negative growth rate occur at the 5 th week. The squab growth rate followed a quadratic pattern. It was concluded that slaughter squab selection could be done at 4 th week old.

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Four complete amino acid sequences of hemoglobin β chains were determined for the swamp and the river types of the Asiatic water buffalo (Bubalus bubalis) and two species of the subgenus Anoa in Bubalus; B. (A.) depressicornis (H. Smith, 1827), the lowland anoa, and B. (A.) quarlesi (Ouwens, 1910), the mountain anoa. The two types of the bubalis were identical in the 145 amino acid residues of the β chains and, compared to this sequence, the two residues were substituted in the depressicornis (β49Thr → Ser and 134Ala → Thr) and the five were in the quarlesi (β53Val → Ile, 74Met → Ile, 111Val → Ile, 115Arg → His and 134Ala → Thr). While both Anoa species diverged from the bubalis by the β134Ala → Thr, they differed from each other by the five substitutions. The Anoa species are endemic to Sulawesi of Indonesia. Their speciation and the present coexistence were discussed with reference to probable immigrations of two ancestral Anoa species to Sulawesi at so long interval that had caused a reproductive isolation between the two wild animals. The earlier immigrants were postulated to be ancestral to the quarlesi and the later ones to the depressicornis.

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