Reproduction Abstracts

Introduction: Timing of sexual maturity is essential in order to establish when reproductive technologies can successfully be performed. To date, little is known about reproductive biology in the Taurotragus genus, which includes only two species: common eland (Taurotragus oryx) and giant eland (Taurotragus derbianus). Here, for the first time, we explored testicular development throughout puberty in common eland.Materials and ...

Introduction: Testes investment plays a major role in male reproductive success because larger testes are expected to produce higher sperm number and quality. In birds, comparative studies have shown that testis size – a proxy measure of postcopulatory sexual selection – is negatively related with the intraspecific variation of sperm design. By contrast, links between the intramale variation of sperm morphometry and testicular size in mammals are unknown. Here, for t...