Questions on AI

Ok...here goes...


 


we Ai'd on Saturday and the physical  Ai itself went exceptionally well. My question or questions are:


 


1) Do you guys check your semen with a microscope before you AI?


2) Do you still use it if it's not very lively?


3) I presume the less lively the less chance for conception


4) Does less lively = more does??? i know in humans the male is faster and dies sooner whereas the female is slower stronger and lives longer.


5) if it's less lively should one use the full straw instead of splitting it..but then i would really have to ship double the semen and ship back what we don't use


6) Does it get less lively if it's old semen


7) How many should one see under a microscope?


 


I'm just not feeling good about what i saw in the microscope. 4 out of 5 straws didn't look very good in my opinion. The only straw i felt good about was Fear factor


I REALLY wish i hadn't looked in the microscope before ai'ing. I've been worried..pissed..upset ever since Saturday. Don't get me wrong here...ALL the straws were alive..just not what i expected to see. In comparison to the Fear Factor straw, the others were about 1/4-1/3 of what it was

I will leave this up to the pros, but I will say do not stress over it at this point. What is done is done. For future reference, we have extra straws in the tank for insurance. I actually had enough to do all does twice this year. We had a buck freshly sexed and even though it looked good at Sexing Technologies, I wanted to make sure our Dr. Bringins thought it looked good on site. I hope you have a great success rate.

We too always have more on hand than we are planning on using. If the straw was not very active and the A/I tech said he was not comfortable with the activity he or she saw................Then I would not split...............................But I know of several bucks that the longer they are thawed the more active they get. 


 


But Brad is right whats done is done and you will find thats part of planning your A/I next year!


 


Best of Luck!

When I have Dr Bringans do my AI he checks them just as a matter of record. When we do it ourselves we don't even bother to check the straws. It is not uncommon for a straw to look less than active on initial inspection and grow more lively over a period of a few minutes. In the past there have been straws that looked poor and they were the straws that had better results. I have never not used a straw based on how it looked under the scope.

Roger...THANK YOU!!! that makes me feel better...i won't look again lol


 


Brad and wayne...thanks so much for your replies too....it all helps...just seems like a waste to ship back straws to glss at $130 BUT prolly cheaper in the long run...Never thought there was this much to deer lol geesh..ALWAYS SOMETHING!!!!

D&T Whitetails885521383614020



Roger...THANK YOU!!! that makes me feel better...i won't look again lol


 


Brad and wayne...thanks so much for your replies too....it all helps...just seems like a waste to ship back straws to glss at $130 BUT prolly cheaper in the long run...Never thought there was this much to deer lol geesh..ALWAYS SOMETHING!!!!




 


No tank on the farm?  I never have looked at our straws and i have always used a whole straw. If i was using high dollar straws then im sure i would try but for the price of a straw of say Fear Factor and that class i use it all in 1 doe. Im sure thats why i have only had 1 miss in 3 years. Good Luck with what you did!

We are fortunate to have Genex about 30 miles from us. We store ours there and pick it up when needed and then return it when we are done.

We have a cheap short term storage tank...starting to wonder if long term it would be better to store my own...need to find the cost of nitrogen...can't be that much..but shipping purchased straws would kill a person so prolly not worth the cost for me..we split 5 straws into 10 deer...don't think we did anything out of the ordinary