Seasonal study of Bacterial Count and somatic cell of milk in Kurdistan Province

This study was carried out to evaluate the quality of raw milk measured by total Bacterial count (TBC) and Somatic Cell count (SCC). Altogether 143 Raw milk samples from traditional dairy farm in four stages (milking time to the delivery time to collecting centers) and 85 samples from semi industrial dairy cattle in three stages (milking time to the delivery time to factory) were collected aseptically into sterile screwed test tube and examined for TBC and SCC based on national standard No.5484 and 5028-1 respectively. Results showed a great variability of TBC and SCC for the overall study. TBC had increased from milking time to Bidon in traditional dairy farm and from milking time to delivery time to factory in semi industrial factory. There was statistical differences between traditional dairy farm and semi industrial, though semi industrial with 4082×103cfu/ml had higher TBC than traditional farm (P0.05). The highest number of TBC was observed in summers, which was 128×103cfu/ml and 6361.43×103cfu/ml for traditional dairy farm and semi industrial respectively. The TBC of Sanandaj, Dehgolan and Kamyaran cities had no significant differences (P0.05), although the highest number of TBC was belong to dairy farm and semi industrial farm of Dehgolan city. Results showed no correlation between SCC and TBC. The SCC of traditional dairy farm in all stages of sampling had significant differences and it was not statistically significant among semi industrial dairy farm (P0.05). The mean of SCC had no significant differences between different seasons and mentioned cities. Based on the exceedingly high microbial counts found in this study, (The TBC of 72.72% of samples was higher than national standard of Iran) it could be concluded that this milk type poses a serious health risk in the mentioned areas and needs real improvement from production point to processing plant.