Rehnus Maik, Palme Rupert
Swiss Federal Research Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research WSL, Zürcherstrasse 111, 8903 Birmensdorf, Switzerland.
Department of Biomedical Sciences, University of Veterinary Medicine, Veterinärplatz 1, 1210 Vienna, Austria.
Animals (Basel). 2021 Sep 16;11(9):2710. doi: 10.3390/ani11092710.
The measurement of glucocorticoid metabolites (GCMs) in faeces has become a widely used and effective tool for evaluating the amount of stress experienced by animals. However, the potential sampling bias resulting from an oversampling of individuals in different states of pregnancy has rarely been investigated. In this study, we validate a noninvasive method for measuring gestagen metabolites in female mountain hares () under controlled conditions. We also measured the concentration of gestagen metabolites of females in a free-ranging population during the early breeding and post-breeding periods from 2014 to 2019. We found significant yearly variations in gestagen metabolites, which were related to the condition of the females due to the snow cover duration before and at the start of the reproduction period. GCMs were significantly influenced by the gestagen metabolite levels. These results are important for improving the interpretation of GCM concentrations in free-ranging populations during the breeding and reproductive periods.
粪便中糖皮质激素代谢物（GCMs）的测量已成为评估动物所经历应激量的一种广泛使用且有效的工具。然而，因对处于不同妊娠状态的个体过度采样而导致的潜在采样偏差很少得到研究。在本研究中，我们在可控条件下验证了一种测量雌性山地野兔孕体激素代谢物的非侵入性方法。我们还测量了2014年至2019年自由放养种群中雌性在繁殖早期和繁殖后期的孕体激素代谢物浓度。我们发现孕体激素代谢物存在显著的年度变化，这与繁殖期之前和开始时积雪持续时间导致的雌性状况有关。GCMs受孕体激素代谢物水平的显著影响。这些结果对于改进对繁殖期和生殖期自由放养种群中GCM浓度的解释具有重要意义。
