THE EFFECT OF MATING UPON LH RELEASE IN MALE AND FEMALE VOLES OF THE SPECIES <i>MICROTUS AGRESTIS</i>

Abstract

Department of Human Anatomy, South Parks Road, Oxford (Received 13th July 1974) Members of the microtine species are probably reflex ovulators. The prairie vole, Microtus ochrogaster (Richmond &amp; Conway, 1969), the meadow vole, M. pennsylvanicus (Clulow &amp; Mallory, 1970), the levant vole, M. guentheri (Bodenheimer &amp; Sulman, 1946), the Californian vole, M. californicus (Greenwald, 1956), and the montane vole, Microtus montanus (Gray, Davis, Zerylnick &amp; Dewsbury, 1974) have all been regarded as coming into this category and Breed (1967) has demonstrated that members of M. agrestis are also reflex ovulators. As ovulation is normally preceded by a surge of LH in the blood, post-coital levels of serum LH were measured by radioimmunoassay in female and male voles (M. agrestis) after mating. The method used was that described by Niswender, Midgley, Monroe &amp; Reichert (1968) for rat LH, as modified by Naftolin &amp; Corker (1971). The voles in these experiments were