Pregnancy in the Caspian miniature horse using frozen semen cryopreserved with the EquiPRO CryoGuard freeze medium and customized freezing protocols

Pregnancy in the Caspian miniature horse using frozen semen cryopreserved with the EquiPRO CryoGuard freeze medium and customized freezing protocols

Hiva Alipour DVM, Mina Sharbatoghli MSc, Poopak Eftekhari Yazdi PhD, Abdolhossein Shahverdi PhD, Mohamad Taghi Daneshzadeh DVM, Masoud Afshani DVM, Seied Jalal Mirian DVM, Hormoz Hamidi DVM, Ahmad Reza Mohammadi DVM, Mojtaba Rezazadeh Valojerdi PhD

Department of Embryology, Royan Institute for Reproductive Biomedicine, ACECR, Tehran, Iran; Agricultural and Resource Research Center, Jihad-e-Agriculture, Tehran, Iran

The primary goal of this project was to establish a protocol to freeze the sperm of the Caspian miniature horse in an attempt to start an intensive artificial insemination program to effectively increase the population of this breed, which has been listed as “Critical Rare Breed” by the American Livestock Breed Conservancy and is in danger of extinction. Commercially available equine freezing medium (EquiPRO CyoGuard Complete egg-yolk extender) was used for the initial setup of two different freeze protocols: slow and fast. The fast-freeze protocol had slightly better postthaw results and was used for a fertility demonstration. Five mares of proven fertility, aged 3 to 12 years, were used in the fertility trials, two of which resulted in pregnancy. This is the first report of pregnancy in the Caspian miniature horse using frozen semen, and the results seem to be a promising start to an extensive program to help this endangered breed, although further research on freezing protocols and conditions for this process are necessary to further improve the survival of semen and pregnancy rate.

doi:10.1016/j.jevs.2012.07.005