Prof Dr Md Bahanur Rahman of Bangladesh Agricultural University sets out how buyers can tell artificially fattened cattle from healthy ones and urges farmers to fatten animals naturally.
Faridpur's largest cattle market, Tepakhola, is crowded ahead of Eid, but sellers outnumber buyers, big cattle have little demand and prices are lower.
Ahead of Eid-ul-Azha, demand for wooden chopping blocks, especially tamarind, is rising in Barishal, with blocks selling for Tk 300 to 1,000 depending on size.
Nineteen temporary animal markets will be held in Dhaka's two city corporations for Eid-ul-Azha, though a protest-driven lockout has delayed several DSCC leases.
The army handed two leaders of the BNP and the Anti-Discrimination Student Movement to police over extortion from a buffalo trader at Jatrapur market in Kurigram.
Robbers looted 12 sacrificial cattle from a pickup on the Dhaka-Chattogram highway in Sitakunda, and police have yet to recover the animals.
Days before Eid-ul-Azha, Chuadanga farmers who fattened large cattle are anxious as costs rise, markets stay slow and traders stay away.
Vehicles carrying sacrificial animals must show their designated market, and anyone stopping them on the way will face action, the home adviser said.
The railway authority has asked all concerned not to hold cattle markets on railway land or beside rail lines without prior approval from Bangladesh Railway.
A stakeholder meeting in Dhaka told officials not to lease 217 identified sacrificial animal markets on or beside highways ahead of Eid-ul-Azha.
The High Court has stayed a temporary Eid-ul-Azha cattle market in two blocks of Aftabnagar's Eastern Housing and part of Sun Valley, leased out by Dhaka North City Corporation.
Special trains will again carry sacrificial animals this year, from North Bengal via Dhaka to Chattogram, the fisheries and livestock adviser said.
The illegal entry of livestock across the border will be completely banned from 5 May, Fisheries and Livestock Adviser Farida Akhter said.
