Application of laparoscopic and transcervical artificial insemination in sheep breeding

The application of assisted reproductive technologies play an important role in sheep breeding. The genetical progress, selection and preservation can be provided by these methods quickly and more effectively. The ewes should be synchronized by intravaginal devices containing progesterone -like hormone before the artificial insemination. The insemination can be vaginal, deep cervical, transcervical and laparoscopic, depending on the deposition of the sperm. The laparoscopic technique is a minimal invasive method in which two one cm wide skin incisions are needed where the trocars pierce through the abdominal wall and we can inject the sperm into the uterus. This technique is used worldwide in sheep breeding with goad efficiency (40-80% pregnancy rate, depending on the protocol, season, breed, age) so this is the most successful way for inseminating with frozen sperm but it needs expensive equipment and high level of knowledge and the ewes need to be sedated before the procedure. The frozen sperm can be used by transcervical technique as well where the insemination catheter is going through the cervix and the sperm is injected into the uterine cavity. This method is not widely spread and used in farm conditions because of the anatomy of the sheep cervix, which is narrow, closed and it is hard to penetrate it with a catheter. The successful use of the transcervical method depends also on the protocol, breed, age, number of lambings and the anatomy of the external os. Because of the limits of this technique, it is not widely used in the practice, although it has a lot of benefits, and due to animal health and welfare aspects (no need for sedation and starvation, no postoperative complications, no need for antibiotic), developing of the transcervical technique is a good possibility for research in sheep reproduction.