Influence of cornual insemination on conception in dairy cattle

The objective of this study was to compare conception to artificial insemination (AI) services in dairy cattle when semen was deposited into the uterine body or into both uterine horns (cornual insemination). Nine herdsman inseminators (HI) in four commercial dairy herds in Washington constituted the experimental units. Herds ranged in size from 393 cows to 964 cows. The duration of the experiment was 12 mo in three herds and 18 mo in the fourth herd. At the beginning of the experiment all inseminators were trained to deposit semen in the body of the uterus. Inseminators were instructed to use this method for 6 mo. Following employment of body deposition, the same inseminators were retrained to deposit one-half of the semen into the right uterine horn and one-half into the left uterine horn. Cornual inseminations were performed for 6 mo. A total of 4,178 services constituted the data set. Milk samples were collected from cows on the day of insemination and later were assayed for progesterone (P4). There was variation (P less than .01) in conception associated with month of insemination and insemination method (P less than .001). The monthly variation was not associated with season of the year. Least squares means for conception when semen was deposited in the uterine body was 44.7%, compared with 64.6% when cornual insemination was employed. The insemination treatment X inseminator interaction was not significant. Results suggest that cornual insemination provides an alternative to deposition of semen in the uterine body.