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Transported Semen for the Small Breeder
Part 3 Frozen Semen
This article may be downloaded for personal use only. For information on reprint rates please send me e-mail at oogiem@desertweyr.com
Why Bother?
We are a small breeder of Crabbet, Maynesboro and classic Kellogg Arabians. We have been operating a fresh cooled transported semen program with our stallions for the last two years. In 1994 we decided to bank frozen semen from our stallions. One of our stallions is older and has had some health problems. We wanted semen in storage as an insurance policy. In addition we wished to offer a full range of stallion services to mare owners and adding frozen semen was a logical next step. This article describes the problems and procedures we encountered during this process.Planning
As a first step to considering the use of frozen semen we arranged for a meeting with our regular veterinarian. She has been assisting us with our transported semen program and has handled several mares bred via frozen semen. She also participated in a project with another client to freeze semen so we felt she would be able to assist us.Our vet pointed out that protocols for freezing equine semen are still not well defined. Some stallions semen cannot be frozen. Some semen even though it freezes well and has good post thaw mobility cannot impregnate a mare. She suggested we look carefully into the costs and weight the risks before embarking on such an expensive procedure.
There are several competing veterinarians who provide freezing services. As part of our preparation we called all the major veterinarians who offer this service and asked them a series of questions about procedures and costs. How are the stallions handled? Do the stallions have to stay there? Are jump mares available? What are the costs per collection, per insemination dose and per day? Can the semen be stored there? How do they handle shipping semen to mare owners? What has been their success rate? How many stallions have they performed freezing on? How many of those were not successful? How is the semen prepared? What antibiotics do they routinely use? Have they used semen they processed to breed mares later? What is the pregnancy rate of those mares?
We developed a document that compared the costs and also the answers to the questions. We did not want to select the least expensive person if their success rate was poor. Our research allowed us to narrow the field to two possible candidates. A second detailed phone interview was conducted. During this discussion we asked questions that we knew were difficult. Does frozen semen capacitate in storage? What number of forwardly motile sperm do you package in an insemination dose? How do you determine the number of sperm in an ejaculation?
We finally selected Dr. Carl Gray from Equine Breeders International Inc. He brings all his lab equipment to your farm and does the entire procedure over two days of collecting. Although he does not guarantee success his overall success rate was very good. We felt he was knowledgeable, fair and comfortable to work with.
Since Dr. Gray comes to the farm we decided to make this a major project and collect and freeze semen from all three stallions and from our donkey jack. That way we could amortize the expenses for his plane fare, hotel and shipping the equipment over more stallions. We also were required to have our regular farm veterinarian present to perform the actual collection. We arranged for catering and additional handlers so we could assembly line collect the stallions. Since the actual number of insemination doses processed would be determined by the quality of the collection we could not determine for certain what our final expenses would be. We estimated the expenses and felt that as an insurance policy on our old stallion it was worth the expense.
The "Great Freezing Project"
Once the dates were set up Dr. Gray arranged to ship us empty nitrogen containers. We had to arrange for delivery of liquid nitrogen to fill all the containers. A local medical gas supply place sells liquid nitrogen. We also had to get the required transported semen permits from the Arabian Horse Registry in place prior to the collection process. The stallions had to be collected three or four weeks prior to the freezing date but then they were on complete sexual rest until the freezing week.Dr. Gray arrived Monday evening. Tuesday morning he came out to the farm and brought out all his equipment. We had to provide a clear table, electricity and room in our refrigerator. We set up the laboratory in the dining room and the AV preparation area in the kitchen. Our regular vet arrived and we prepared the AV for collection. For safety during the collection process we use three people; the vet, who is doing the actual collection, and two animal handlers. We had built a breeding phantom but none of the stallions had been tested on it before this process. We also had a mare in heat available who had proven to be a good jump mare.
The actual collections went very smoothly for the stallions. We used the mare for the first time for each stallion but after than we did not need her. Instead she was in a pen adjacent to the breeding dummy. We collected each stallion twice each day for a total of four collections. By the second collection of the day all the stallions had been trained to the breeding dummy. One of our stallions was quite young and he was only collected once each day. Our donkey jack produced such volumes of ejaculate and is such a difficult animal to collect that we decided to freeze only three collections from him. As soon as the semen was collected the veterinarian rushed it into the house where the laboratory was set up.
According to Dr. Gray this two day process results in the best number of inseminations doses for a reasonable expense. The semen is counted to determine the number of motile sperm. The number of insemination doses is determined by the volume and quality of the semen. The goal is to have 250 million forwardly progressive motile sperm after thawing. The actual freezing involves extending the semen in a proprietary extender and preparing it using a proprietary process. To verify the freezing process Dr. Gray evaluates the post thaw mobility on each and every collection. The individual packets of semen are labeled with the stallions name, registration number and date of collection.
The freezing process was two days of hard work. Between rushing out to collect semen and waiting for the processing of the last batch to be completed it was a whirlwind of frenetic activity interspersed by waiting. At the conclusion of the process we put all the inseminations in a single container and shipped it back to Dr. Gray's facility. He will store the semen for us for a small fee. When we need to ship semen to a mare owner we authorize him to ship semen. The mare owner provides the shipping fee and a container deposit.
The final test of the freezing process is mares in foal. Because we froze semen in September we did not have the opportunity to verify it by inseminating mares. We will be concluding the testing next year when we hope to get mares in foal by all three stallions and by our donkey jack. Only then can we be certain that we have a successful process. All indications are positive and we look forward to providing frozen semen as an option to mare owners in 1995.
The final item is the paperwork. According to the Arabian Horse Registry the rules regarding transported semen will be changing in 1995. A brief article in the Registry news indicated that there will be more freedom to use semen after the death, sale or castration of the stallion. These new rules make our investment in our semen bank more valuable. If you are considering freezing semen we urge you to contact the registry and ensure you are following the current rules.
If you plan to ship semen to a foreign country you need to be aware of additional requirements. The USDA controls the shipment of semen between countries. The semen must be collected and processed according to the receiving country's rules. These rules can include required testing, vaccinations, types of extenders used, permits or fees paid per insemination dose and so on. We had initially investigated collecting semen and packaging it according to the rules for importation into England, Canada, New Zealand and Australia. These are some of the most difficult countries to ship biological material too and the quarantine requirements are strict. We chose not to prepare semen according to these rules for this time but may consider that in the future.
CMK horses are a valuable resource that we hold for future generations. Semen banking using frozen semen is another tool we can use to preserve the genetic variability that is so important to our breed. We feel that the expense and hassle of freezing semen will pay dividends as an insurance policy in the event of the untimely death or injury to our stallions and as an additional option for mare owners. In combination with our fresh cooled transported semen program we now are prepared to offer mare owners a complete line of stallion services.