Abstract   

    Data on 2704 lactations of 993 Nili-Ravi buffaloes were analyzed to investigate the extent and behavior of short and complete lactations. Lactation milk yield up to 44 weeks was used and lactations with less .than eight weeks of duration were excluded. Fifty nine percent of the lactation records were shorter than 44 weeks. When minimum lactation length was required to be 26 weeks, 11% of lactations did not meet this criterion. Among 2107 lactations of< 308 days duration, reasons of drying were known for 534 lactations (25%). Out of these 31% had mastitis, 16% were shorter because buffaloes had been auctioned while she was in milk, 13% had bad temperament .while the other 40% were short because of reproductive problems and other reasons such as death of calf, old age, disease etc. Lactation curves were different for first and later parities with lactations of different duration. About 10% of lactations were atypical, with first calvers having the highest frequency. Improvement in data recording will help explore lactation length problems mote precisely in future.    

Key words: Short and atypical, lactations, Nili-Ravi.