Progesterone and Cortisol Levels in Blood and Hair of Wild Pregnant Red Deer (Cervus Elaphus) Hinds
Open accessAbstract
L., 1758) is one of the largest deer species in the world. Females are seasonal polyestrous, with negative photoperiod: the increase of the night peak of melatonin determines the secretion of GnRH and, therefore, LH and FSH. To date there is little information regarding the hormonal control during pregnancy for this species; this could be due to the difficulty of sampling wild subjects, while farmed animals' hormonal concentrations may not reflect the physiology of the animal in a natural state. In this study we evaluated the concentration of cortisol and progesterone, extracted from blood and hair, on 10 wild and pregnant red deer females. Belonging to the population of the Bolognese Apennines (Italy), the hinds were sampled in the January-March 2018 period, according to the regional selective hunting plan. Plasma progesterone (P4) ranged from a minimum of 1.9 to a maximum of 7.48 ng/mL; while hair P4 concentrations varied from 41.68 to 153.57 pg/mg. The plasma and hair cortisol ranges are respectively 0.4-2.97 ng/mL and 0.03-0.55 pg/mg; the only significant correlation was found between hair concentration of P4 and the date of death. The results of this preliminary study represent a small step towards a better knowledge of this species' physiology during pregnancy.
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The paper found weak correlation or partial positive correlation for hormone circadian oscillations between glucocorticoids and gonadal hormones.
“As stated above, we found weak correlation or partial positive correlation for hormone circadian oscillations; see e.g. [114–116].”
From Fibromyalgia pathogenesis explained by a neuroendocrine multistable model (2024) · cites this paper as [115]
The Results and Discussion report a weak, statistically nonsignificant correlation between plasma progesterone and cortisol in pregnant red deer hinds. They do not report a correlation between the hormones’ circadian oscillations; the Discussion only notes that blood cortisol changes throughout the day. (LLM, conf=0.88)
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- Authors
- Ventrella, D., Elmi, A., Bertocchi, M., Aniballi, C., Parmeggiani, A., Govoni, N., & Bacci, M. L.
- Affiliations
- University of Bologna (IT)
- Corresponding author
- Bertocchi, Martina
- ORCID
- Venue
- Animals
- Publisher
- MDPI AG
- Published
- 2020-01-16
- Volume
- 10
- Issue
- 1
- Pages
- 143
- ISSN
- 2076-2615 (ISSN-L)
- PMC
- PMC7022734
- OpenAlex
- W2998847543
- Cited by
- 24
- References
- 34
- Citations by year
- 2026: 2 · 2025: 5 · 2024: 7 · 2023: 2 · 2022: 2 · 2021: 3 · 2020: 3
- FWCI
- 3.13
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- gold
- dx.doi.org
- Licence
- Locations
- Animals (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- CINECA IRIS Institutial research information system (University of Pisa) (submittedVersion, cc-by)
- Archivio istituzionale della ricerca (Alma Mater Studiorum Università di Bologna) (submittedVersion, cc-by)
- DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion, cc-by-sa)
- Funders
- Università di Bologna
- Université de Reims Champagne-Ardenne
- Topics
- Life Sciences › Agricultural and Biological Sciences › Agronomy and Crop Science › Reproductive Physiology in Livestock
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Ecology › Wildlife Ecology and Conservation
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Reproductive Medicine › Sperm and Testicular Function
- Keywords
- red deer, pregnancy, progesterone, cortisol, hair analysis, blood sampling, reproductive physiology, Bolognese Apennines
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