ABSTRACT
The rabbit is eminently suitable for work involving egg recovery and transfer, and the experimental manipulation of pregnancy. It is freely available and easily managed under laboratory conditions; it breeds throughout the year and is easy to mate or artificially inseminate. Ovulation, which is nonspontaneous and normally induced by mating, can also be induced by treatment with Luteinizing hormone-releasing hormone or human chorionic gonadotrophin, which it follows after 10 to 12 hr. Eggs from follicle stimulating hormone-treated rabbits have been extensively used for transfer. Experience has shown that their developmental potential compares favorably with that of eggs from untreated donors. Anesthesia is relatively easy to induce and manage in the rabbit. After entering the uterus the eggs, now early blastocysts, remain clustered for some time near the utero-tubal junction. The rabbit has proved a valuable model for a variety of studies which could only have been undertaken by means of egg transfer.
