ARTIFICIAL INSEMINATION IN FARM ANIMALS - Phenix-Vet

68Artificial Insemination in Farm Animals(fresh, chilled or frozen) and sperm quality (total and progressive motility and spermspeed), besides some individual variations (Rijsselaere et al., 2004). However, despite theinfluence of the intrauterine vs. vaginal insemination on the success of the procedure, onceintrauterine insemination is achieve, the exact place of semen deposition is not of the mainimportance for the sperm distribution within the uterus (England et al., 2006; Rijsselaere etal., 2004). Consequently, no potential differences or advantages exist between the vaginalendoscopic approach and laparoscopy when the intra-uterine insemination is intended, asno differences were found in the deposition of the semen in the uterine body or the cranialtip of the uterine horns (Fukushima et al., 2010). Nevertheless, abdominal laparoscopy orsurgery is strongly discouraged on the basis of animal welfare issues, as non-healthy relatedinvading procedure that should be avoided.Based on the last two years inseminations performed at the clinic (with a global success rateof around 75%), using a comercial kit for progesterone determination, fresh semen andintra-vaginal deposition (2 AI, 48h apart), it was found that when inseminations wereperformed with progesterone levels above 8 ng/mL a higher success rate and a closer topredicted whelping dates were achieved (Table 11), comparing to inseminations at lowerlevels of progesterone (2.5-8 ng/mL). No diferences were found in the litter size betweenthese groups, which were very similar in age and parity of the bitches.SemenFresh 39Number ofanimalsChilled 421812Range ofage (mean)1-6 years(2.94 years)1-6 years(3.23 years)1-6 years(3.6 years)Progesteroneat AI (ng/ml)2.5 to 8ng/mLDays fromlast IA towhelpingSuccess rate(nº femaleswhelped/inseminated)Liter size(± SD)63 66.6 6.33± 2.84> 8 ng/mL 61 80.95 6.29 ± 2.26>8 ng/mL 61 73.8 6.1 ±2.51Table 11. Results for the AI procedures with fresh and chilled semen and 2 AI per animal,48h apart.Independently of the place for semen deposition, repeating the AI at 24-48 hrs intervalsresults in a significantly higher fertility: for fresh semen both the pregnancy rate and littersize present a significantly increase when multiple AI are performed (Linde-Forsberg &Forsberg, 1993), whilst for frozen semen the differences on the pregnancy rates are notsignificant, although litter size tended to increase with the number of inseminations (Linde-Forsberg, 2000, 2002a).5.4.1 Deep vaginal inseminationDeep vaginal insemination is probably the widestly used method for insemination with freshsemen when the technique is performed by the breeder or in small budget clinics. For vaginalAI a simple plastic catheter of proper length may be used, to which a plastic disposablesyringe containing the semen is attached. Or a commercial catheter in flexible latex tubepresenting an inflatable balloon at the tip, like the Osiris gun, may be used; when inflated, this