May graduate Hanum Wensil-Strow works in the lab on horse sperm samples.
Image Credit: Hanum Wensil-Strow
Golden frogs, white rhinos, polar bears, Arabian horses: These are just some of the endangered species students from the College of Agriculture and Natural Resources (AGNR) are helping to protect and preserve through reproductive research. Two May AGNR graduates and one senior animal science major spent time this summer interning at facilities in Washington, D.C., Memphis, TN and San Diego, CA working to help wildlife survive extinction.
Animal science senior Delaney Honeyford, for example, has been working at the Center for Species Survival at the Smithsonian Biological Conservation Institute at the National Zoo since September 2013, but was selected this summer as the intern for Ms. Gina Della Togna’s research on the endangered Panamanian Golden Frogs.
The frogs have become increasing rare since 2007 due to the spread of a fungal infection called chrytridiomycosis in Central America. Therefore, for the last five years, Tonga’s research has been attempting to find a way to collect sperm from the remaining Panamanian Golden Frogs, preserve and freeze the sperm, and then successfully thaw and use that sperm to fertilize an egg many years in the future.
“A zoo veterinarian must be the one to inject any hormones or drugs we use on the frogs to stimulate sperm production,” Honeyford explained. “I will handle the frogs between these tasks and it can be a little nerve-wracking to be working with such tiny creatures (average size about 4-6 centimeters) and knowing that they're some of the last of their kind on the planet.”
“One day of collections from a handful of the frogs can give us enough sperm to work on for several months,” Honeyford said.
Similarly, while interning with Dr. Katrina Knott at the Memphis Zoo, May graduate Lainie Brice has been working with another endangered species: polar bears. Brice says polar bears are difficult to breed in captivity because they only cycle once a year and are susceptible to pseudopregnancies and delayed implantation.
”You can't really do an ultrasound on a polar bear since they're dangerous animals, and we don't like to knock down (use anesthesia) the animal if we don't have to,” Brice said. “As such, we don't really have a sure way of knowing if a bear is pregnant, so we're trying to figure out how to tell if a bear is pregnant… and the idea is to plan for birth and maybe even try artificial insemination, which has never been done in polar bears.”
While Brice does not get to interact with the polar bears directly, she analizes the hormone levels of their urine to try to determine the readiness of the female to breed.
Meanwhile, at the San Diego Zoo, May animal science and environmental science and policy dual degree graduate Hanum Wensil-Strow witnessed sperm collections from a polar bear and a white rhino, though the research she has been conducting with Dr. Barbara Durrant has focused primarily on horses.
“We are looking at optimizing our current Perissodactyl (equids, rhinos, and tapirs) semen freezing protocols through the use of a domestic horse model,” Wensil-Strow said. “Many Perissodactlys are endangered so it’s imperative that we save genetic samples from them and do whatever we can to help these species.”
Each week, Wensil-Strow travels to a nearby Arabian horse farm to collect and freeze semen samples from two stallions, using a different technique each procedure. Nevertheless, Wensil-Strow says the highlight of her work this summer was the white rhino sperm collection.
“When we found moving sperm it was a very emotional moment and I realized how important this procedure was; all of us there were fighting to end extinction,” she says “I’ve always been passionate about wildlife and saving species, but seeing an animal like that up close while surrounded by such passionate and caring people, is truly an unforgettable and inspiring experience.”
