Muscle fibre morphometry in three dog muscles of different functional purpose in different breeds

Following a study of fibre population fibre size was determined in three muscles of different functional purpose in four breeds of dog with different locomotory capacities. Samples were taken from specific sites in the tibialis cranialis (extensor), flexor digitalis medialis (flexor) and pectineus (adductor) muscles of 27 dogs of four different breeds--German shepherd, Spanish greyhound, Spanish mastiff and Iberian hound--. Samples were subjected to histochemical analysis using ATPase (pH 9.4) and fibre size was assessed using an IBAS-2 Kontron image analyser.