Long-term study on the effects of electroejaculation on seminal characteristics of the domestic cat

Semen was collected by electroejaculation from 9 random-source cats. There were 22 seminal collections over 32 weeks. An electroejaculate was defined as the seminal fluid and spermatozoa collected during the application of 60 electrical stimuli--the 1st 40 stimuli at 2.0 V, and immediately afterward, 20 stimuli at 3.0 V. Four sequential electroejaculates were obtained from each cat at each seminal collection. The volume and number of spermatozoa for each electroejaculate were determined. There was a significant (P less than 0.005) effect of cat and sequence of electroejaculate for both the volume and number of spermatozoa in the electroejaculate . There was no effect of week of collection; however, there was a trend (P less than 0.1) for the volume of electroejaculate to increase with time. The interactions of cat X week of collection and electroejaculate sequence X week of collection for the volume and for the number of spermatozoa per electroejaculate were not significant (P greater than 0.05). The volume of the 1st electroejaculate of the sequence was lower (P less than 0.01) and the number of spermatozoa in the 2nd of the sequential electroejaculates was higher (P less than 0.05). There was considerable variation within and between cats in the volume and number of spermatozoa. Repeated anesthesia and electrical stimulation did not appear to alter the ejaculatory capacity of the cat.