The accurate detection of the ovulation day is considered as one of the most critical point to determine the proper time for bitch mating. So, the objective of the current study was detecting the optimal time of mating the bitches based on using either vaginal cytology or assaying the plasma progestrone levels with subsequent determination of the pregnancy rates. One hundred and twenty adult bitches were used in this study and classified into three groups; each group consists of 40 bitches. Group 1 in which bitches were optimized for mating based on the vaginal cytology, group 2 and group 3 in which bitches were allowed for mating whenever the plasma progestrone levelswere 3-4 ng ̸ ml and 4-5 ng ̸ ml, respectively.The results showed that, there is no significant difference in the percentages of pregnancy rates between both group 1 and group 3 (87.5% and 92.5%, respectively) but both groups were significantly p˂0.05 higher than that of group 2 (77.5%). In conclusion, higher pregnancy rates will be obtained if the bitches were mated on the basis of either presence of 80% or more cornified epithelial cells in the vaginal smear or the plasma progesterone level was between 4 to 5 ng ̸ ml.
Key words: Vaginal cytology, Ovulation detection, Plasma progesterone, Bitches, Breeding time
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