Effect of Exogenous Progesterone on Testes Characteristics of Large White Pigs in a Humid Enviroment

Abstract

A total of 24 pigs were used for the experiment to determine the effect of exogenous progesterone administered by intramuscular injection on testicular characteristics especially daily sperm production (DSP). The experiment commence at birth for the pigs. The injections were administered once weekly to 24 weeks of age. Progesterone was given at the rate of 1.0mg/kg body weight. At the end of the 24 weeks, the pigs were slaughtered and their testes harvested. The parameters measured include seminiferous tubule diameter, paired testes weight (PTW), testis density, Daily sperm production (DSP) from gonadal sperm reserves (GSR) and DSP from quantitative testicular histology (QTH). The results show that progesterone significantly (P<0.05) increased the values of DSP from QTH (18.12±3.71; 30.87±3.0). The same trend was recorded for Seminiferous tubule diameter (117.73±11.26μ and 164.99±21.90μ respectively for control and testosterone). This present results show that exogenous administration of progesterone to large white male pigs, could be used to accelerate spermatogenesis and thus reproductive efficiency in swine herds especially for boars.

Key words: Progesteron, pigs, testes characteristics