Experimentally Induced Proliferation of the Rudimentary Gonad of an Intact Domestic Fowl

Abstract

IT is well known that the right female gonad of the domestic fowl ceases to grow about the ninth day of incubation and that it always hypertrophies following sinistral ovariectomy. I have shown1 that œstrogen could act in vivo as the inhibitor of rudiment growth. In view of the anti-œstrogenic effect of 17 α-ethyl-19-nortestosterone (‘Nilevar’, Searle) upon the chicken's oviduct2, the effect of this substance upon the rudimentary chicken gonad was investigated. Starting at 60 days of age intact White Leghorn females received 40 subcutaneous injections of ‘Nilevar’. The substance was dissolved in a carrier of 5 per cent benzyl alcohol in corn oil and 0.1 c.c. of solution was injected daily. Experimental procedures were analogous to those outlined in the earlier paper1 and the weights of blotted, fixed (Bouin's fixative) tissue were recorded (Table 1).