The Blood Picture of the Goat: III.—Changes in Haemoglobin Concentration and Physical Measurements Occurring with Age

Abstract

SUMMARY There was a common pattern for the PCV and Hb which showed three phases—a fall during the first mouth, a rise to the third month, and a fall to the mature level at 30 months. Slight dissimilarity in the slopes of these curves produced a fail, a rise and a second fall in MCHC. A multiple regression for PCV, Hb and MCHC showed that when the average PCV value was high the MCHC was also high. Other factors produced high levels at about 6 months for the viscosity and sp, gr. of the whole blood and of the plasma; with this exception, viscosity followed the pattern of the Hb. The correlation between the sp. gr. of the whole blood and the Hb appeared to be disturbed by the same factors that influenced the sp. gr. of the plasma. Nevertheless, the correlation of whole blood with Hb gave better agreement for 49 averages (r = 0·831) than did the specific gravity of whole blood corrected by the subtraction of that of plasma (r = 0·698). Apart from the fact that it reached a peak at 6 months, the sp. gr. of plasma appeared to be ordered independently. Fragility was entirely independent of all other properties including corpuscular size, and it was unique in showing a fall as late as between the 6th and 12th months. Haemoglobin was divisible by electrophoresis into A, B and AB genotypes, and foetal haemoglobin, demonstrated by the same method, was no longer visible at 2 months. Individual samples are recorded in scatter diagrams, and calculated formulae with values at selected times and actual averages at selected times are recorded as tables.