Artificial insemination of farmed red deer (Cervus elaphus)

ABSTRACT ABSTRACTSix experiments involving the artificial insemination (AI) of a total of 300 female red deer (hinds) with frozen-thawed red deer semen (collected by electro-ejaculation) were conducted over 3 years. Insemination took place at fixed times following various oestrous synchronization procedures using progesterone withdrawal and treatment with pregnant mare's serum gonadotropin (PMSG). In the 1st year, the experiments evaluated basic AI techniques in which pregnancy rates were 45% in 20 hinds receiving two inseminations per vaginam (PV) and 56% in 27 hinds inseminated by the laparoscopic intrauterine method (IU). In the 2nd year, the experiments involved comparisons of the progesterone regime, one or two PV inseminations, and the timing of a single PV insemination. There was no effect of replacement of the progesterone device after 9 days and withdrawal 3 days later compared with the use of one device for the whole period in two experiments. The pregnancy rate for a double PV insemination was significantly higher than for a single PV insemination (58 and 34%; P < 005), with the 12-day progesterone/55 h insemination giving a much higher pregnancy rate than the 15-day/55 h insemination (89 and 20% respectively). Although no experiments involved direct comparisons of the routes of insemination, overall pregnancy rates were 56% for IU, 53% for double PV and 35% for single PV inseminations.