Objective:

reproductively characterize indigenous cows of waste in three herds of the province of Huambo, Angola.

Methods:

autochthonous cows of waste were characterized reproductively in three flocks in the province of Huambo, Angola. In June, 331 cows were evaluated; of them 54 of waste, distributed as follows: flock 1 (24), 2 (17) and 3 (13). Age, body condition (CC), total parts (PT) and labor-delivery interval (IPP) were determined. The general descriptive statistics of these variables was carried out; the factor under study was the herd. The age was normally distributed and the herds were compared using ANOVA and Tukey for the multiple comparison of means, the rest of the variables (CC, PT and IPP) were evaluated by Kruskal Wallis and the Mann-Whitney U statistic.

Results:

the general average for age was 8.15 ± 1.80 years and the medians for CC, PT and IPP were: 2.5; 3.0 and 730.0, respectively. In general, the results were far from the optimal values for reproduction. The herd had a significant influence on CC (P <0.05), PT (P <0.01) and IPP (P <0.01).

Conclusions:

it was concluded that, regardless of the effect of the herd, there is a low utilization of the reproductive potential due to the early age of the waste with insufficient quantity of PT and excessively prolonged IPP, in addition to nutritional problems expressed in the low CC.