In several animals, male genitalia create insemination wounds in areas outside the genital orifice of females. I report that such traumatic insemination (TI) occurs in the Drosophila bipectinata complex (Diptera: Drosophilidae) and illustrate a previously unknown evolutionary pathway for this behaviour. Flash fixation of mating pairs revealed the dual function of the paired claw-like basal proc...

Embryo transfer (ET) in cattle has been used for the realisation of breeding programmes world-wide for more than 20 years. The efficiency of breeding technology, i.e. the breeding progress and costs, depends to a large extent on the results of superovulatory treatment and artificial insemination (A.I.). The results of this step are characterised by a high degree of variation. Numerous attempts ...

A total of sixty-six young males were used to evaluate the effect of low (L), medium (M) and high (H) concentrations of dietary digestible energy received during the rearing seasons (autumn and spring) on the performance and main semen characteristics of males for artificial insemination selected by a high growth rate. Males reared during the spring season presented a significantly higher weigh...

There is much interest in the United States and other countries by dog breeders, pet owners, veterinarians and research workers who realize the great potential for the use of frozen semen. This potential is comparable to that already achieved in the cattle breeding industry. Since the first successful pregnancy utilizing frozen dog semen (Seager, 1969), work on aspects of the freezing of dog se...

Lactating rabbits (n=1335) were artificially inseminated to study the effect of the addition of caffeine on rabbit semen stored for up to 96 h. Concentration of 0-5 mM/l were tested. Whereas a concentration of 0.2 mM/l increased spermatozoa motility, higher concentration values adversely affected reproductive parameters. Spermatozoa stored at 18 degrees C for 72-96 h did not have the capacity t...

For the majority of dairy herds where artificial insemination (AI) is practiced, the limiting factor toward obtaining efficient reproductive performance is the failure to detect oestrus in a timely and accurate manner. Periodic visual observation has been the dominant method used to identify cows in oestrus. New approaches are being developed to provide automated systems of detection of oestrus...

In lighting studies with turkey hens, long ahemeral (AH; non-24 h) light-dark cycles have consistently resulted in greater, although not statistically significant, fertility than control 24 h light-dark cycles. The present study was designed to further evaluate AH lighting effects on fertility by an evaluation of the effectiveness of artificial insemination (AI) under less than optimal conditio...

Until recently, sperm donors have remained anonymous under the 1990 Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act. There has been a distinct international trend towards allowing children access to identifying information about their donor. The UK has followed and, subject to parliamentary approval, children born by donations made after 1 April 2005 will be legally entitled to information revealing the...