Secondary sex characteristics and related physiological values in male fallow deer (Dama dama L.) and their relationships to changes in the annual cycle of daylengths: frequency alterations to 4- and 3-month photoperiodic cycles, and subsequent re-synchronisation under natural conditions.

Five adult male fallow deer were maintained in a barn with artificial light control. In a previous experiment, three 6-month photoperiodic cycles entrained morphogenetic and associated physiological values that revealed typical relationships to the antler cycle. Presented here, the light cycle was accelerated to three 4- and one 3-month photoperiods in the same group. Each artificial photoperiod generally resulted not only in an almost complete antler cycle but also in an entire cycle of seasonal fluctuations in neck girth. Increases in plasma levels of alkaline phosphatase (AP), total-, LDL- and HDL-cholesterol, were generally entrained and the maxima revealed positive correlations with antler formation, but the relationships slightly diverged. In neck girth and creatinine, positive correlations to the hard antler period as well as to each other prevailed but diverged. In the 3-month photoperiodic cycle, these relationships were out of synchrony. In the second 4-month cycle, two bucks "missed" shedding and subsequent casting, but commenced antler growth in the following cycle with an in-time shedding. The possibility of desynchronisation of physiological conditions and the question of an endogenous circannual mechanism interacting with daylight are discussed. At the end of the 3-month cycle, experimental indoor and natural outdoor casting was coincident so the group was transferred to outside conditions for re-synchronisation. After spending altogether 36 months in frequency altered photoperiods, the represented values were neither synchronized nor revealed their typical relationships to the antler cycle, except of AP and neck volume. In the second cycle of re-synchronisation, all parameters, except of creatinine, appeared to be resynchronized.