Aberrant estrous cycles in goats (Capra hircus) [Philippines]

Abberant estrous cycles have been reported in goats. This study was conducted to determine the ovarian structures present in short and long cycles. Laparotomy was conducted on does that exhibited estrus approximately 60 hours after onset. Those that did not exhibit estrus were laparotomized 30 days after the last heat. Of the 30 does used in the experiment, 26 were cycling and 4 were non-cycling. Twenty (22.2%) out of 90 cycles observed were short cycles with a mean length of 7.0 plus or minus 0.7 and a range of 4-16 days. Fifty eight (64.4%) were normal cycles with a mean length of 20.6 plus or minus 0.4 days and a range of 18-25 days. Twelve (13.3%) were long with a mean length of 45.4 plus or minus 0.5 days and a range of 31-79 days. The overall mean for all cycles was 21.1 plus or minus 1.3 days with a range of 4-79 days. Mean estrous duration of all observations was 1.6 plus or minus 0.1 days, 1.6 plus or minus 0.2 days for short cycles, 1.7 plus or minus 0.2 for normal and 1.4 plus or1568 minus 0.4 days for long cycles. The mean number of ovulations for short, normal and long cycles were 1.5 plus or minus 0.1, 1.6 plus or minus 0.2 and 1.1 plus or minus 0.2, respectively, and the number of silent ovulations had a mean of 1.4 plus or minus 0.4. The overall mean was 1.4 plus or minus 0.1. There was a mean of 11.5 plus or minus 1.4 follicles present in short cycles, 10.8 plus or minus 3.3 for normal, 12.7 plus or minus 2.5 for long cycles and 15.2 plus or minus 0.5 in silent ovulations. The overall mean was 12.2 plus or minus 0.9 follicles. Five does (41.6%) that exhibited long cycles had silent estrus in between 5 (51.6%) were true long cycles and 2 (16.8%) had slow regression of the Corpus luteum. All short and normal cycles were accompanied by ovulation. Nine out of 10 long cycles had ovulation, one doe had cystic follicles (01.0 cm). results showed that there was a high incidence of aberrant estrous cycles both short and long accompanied by ovulation. The implications on fertility of does with abberant estrous cycles are discus