The relative importance of prenatal and postnatal maternal influences on growth in mice.

The cross-nursing technique was used to assess the relative importance of prenatal and postnatal maternal influences on growth in mice from an unselected population originated from a cross of four highly inbred strains. Body weights were studied at birth, 7-, 14-, 21- and 42-days, in addition to the weight gains between these ages and tail length at 21 and 42 days of age. At littering, each dam in each nursing set retained two of her own offspring and two were transfereed to each of the other dams in the set, so that each nursed litter contained six young representing three mothers. Prenatal influences accounted for 37, 15, 10, 11 and 13 % of the total variation in the respective body weights, while postnatal influences accounted for 0, 64, 65, 49 and 14% at the respective ages. In the case of weight gains, prenatal influences were responsible for 16, 4, 6 and 30%, while postnatal influences were responsible for 66, 66, 31 and 7% of the total variation in gain during the respective four periods examined. Apparently the individual weight gain from 7 to 14 days was a better measure of the lactational performance of the dam than individual 14-day weight. For tail length, prenatal influences accounted for 6 % and 4 % of the total variation in tail length at 21 and 42 days, respectively, while postnatal influences accounted for 60 % and 24 % at the respective ages. Generally, there was no indication of an important interaction between the nurse and the nursed young at any stage studied.