Project Update: November-December 2008

After the wool harvesting finished we conducted our third survey. During this field trip we collected 100 faecal samples. Each sample was collected immediately after an animal’s defaecation; date, time, identity (age, gender, dominance status and reproductive state) of the donor animal were recorded, together with habitat description and food availability.

In addition we measured the vertical and horizontal structure of the vegetation, and we did 4 transects for each habitat type. At the laboratory we freeze-dried faecal samples by lyophilization and then make a powder of the sample. Because steroids are often not evenly distributed within faecal samples we homogenised the powder. We tested different protocols of extraction with several solvents (in different concentration) to extract faecal glucocorticoids (GCs) and then to quantify the concentration of GCs we test several commercial radioimmunoassay kits (DSL-MP-DPC, Etc.).