Lunar Cycle Influences Spontaneous Delivery in Cows

Yonezawa, Tomohiro; Uchida, M.; Tomioka, Michiko; Matsuki, Naoaki

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0161735

Cited by 24 publications

(20 citation statements)

References 23 publications

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“…Here, lunar cycle and weather conditions were investigated to test whether they were associated with DCF or preterm calving in Japanese Black cows. These variables were chosen because the lunar cycle has been reported to be associated with calving frequency in Holstein dairy cows [6] and with birth rates in humans [15], and weather conditions were also associated with calving frequency in beef cows [7]. To assess the effect of those variables on DCF and preterm calving, our research used two studies; one for each day level and the other for cow levels.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Lunar data were also derived from data reported by the Japanese Meteorological Agency. The eight phases of the lunar cycle were categorized in accordance with a previous study [6]: new moon to waxing crescent (Lunar 1); waxing crescent to first quarter (Lunar 2), first quarter to waxing gibbous (Lunar 3), waxing gibbous to full moon (Lunar 4), full moon to waning gibbous (Lunar 5), waning gibbous to last quarter (Lunar 6), last quarter to waning crescent (Lunar 7), and waning crescent to new moon (Lunar 8).…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In sheep, similarly, the distribution of lambing dates did not differ among the various phases of the lunar cycle [5]. In cattle, one study reported that lunar cycles were associated with the frequency of spontaneous birth in 428 Holstein cows: thus, the frequency increased uniformly from the new moon to the full moon phase and then decreased [6]. However, since there has been contradictory findings among different reports in human and sheep, a much larger sample size is likely to be required to achieve an adequate statistical power.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Daily calving frequency and preterm calving is not associated with lunar cycle but preterm calving is associated with weather conditions in Japanese Black cows

et al. 2019

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Several external factors including lunar cycle and weather conditions might be associated with calving conditions. Our objective here was to determine the effects of lunar cycle and weather conditions on calving frequency and the occurrence of preterm calving in Japanese Black cows. Calving records were obtained from 905 farms in Miyazaki Prefecture, Japan. Data were collected from 41,116 calvings. We conducted two studies: Study 1 investigated the effects of lunar cycle and weather conditions on daily calving frequency (DCF) with the observational unit of each day and Study 2 investigated those effects on the occurrence of preterm calving with the observational unit for each calving. Preterm calving was defined by whether or not a cow calving before 280 days of gestation, lower 10th percentile of gestation length of the collected data, and by whether or not a cow calving before 289 days of gestation, median of the gestation length. For Study 1, lunar cycle was not associated with DCF in all cows, in only primiparous cows and in only multiparous cows. As well as lunar cycle, weather conditions such as temperature, diurnal temperature variation, the temperature-humidity index, precipitation amount, barometric pressure, relative humidity and solar radiation, were also not associated with DCF. For Study 2, lunar cycle phases were not associated with the occurrence of preterm calving. However, preterm calving was associated with all of the weather conditions (P < 0.05) except for precipitation amounts and solar radiation. Temperature, the temperature-humidity index and relative humidity were positively associated with the occurrence of preterm calving. In contrast, diurnal temperature variations and barometric pressure were negatively associated with the occurrence of preterm calving. In conclusion, the lunar cycle was not associated with DCF and preterm calving, but the weather conditions were associated with preterm calving.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Daily calving frequency and preterm calving is not associated with lunar cycle but preterm calving is associated with weather conditions in Japanese Black cows

et al. 2019

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“…Moon phases have been reported to increase the number of deliveries in cows [ 32 ]. The same authors would report that apart from the higher birth rates of the dairy cows near and during the full moon, the predicted and real delivery dates significantly differed within the eight moon phases.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Can Donkey Behavior and Cognition Be Used to Trace Back, Explain, or Forecast Moon Cycle and Weather Events?

González

Jordana

Inostroza

et al. 2018

Animals

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Simple SummaryDonkeys have been traditionally attributed the ability to inform humans about the environment. Carefully observing the behavior and cognitive reactions of donkeys in their habitat may enable to quantify such reactions to develop informative mathematical models. These models can be used to explain present environmental situations, trace back past events or even predict future conditions. Our results suggest, environmental stressing situations may affect donkeys in a way that they register the cognitive adaptations or sequels derived from such situations. Furthermore, such environmental events may not only affect the present cognitive status of the animals, but they may drive this cognitive record affecting the behavioral patterns donkeys display through their lives. Our model is able to explain 75.9% of the variability in response type and intensity, mood, or learning capabilities. Conclusively, donkeys can be used as an environment informative sensitive tool and may therefore, predict and register slight human-unappreciable climatic variations to which they may behaviorally adapt beforehand.AbstractDonkeys have been reported to be highly sensitive to environmental changes. Their 8900–8400-year-old evolution process made them interact with diverse environmental situations that were very distant from their harsh origins. These changing situations not only affect donkeys’ short-term behavior but may also determine their long-term cognitive skills from birth. Thus, animal behavior becomes a useful tool to obtain past, present or predict information from the environmental situation of a particular area. We performed an operant conditioning test on 300 donkeys to assess their response type, mood, response intensity, and learning capabilities, while we simultaneously registered 14 categorical environmental factors. We quantified the effect power of such environmental factors on donkey behavior and cognition. We used principal component analysis (CATPCA) to reduce the number of factors affecting each behavioral variable and built categorical regression (CATREG) equations to model for the effects of potential factor combinations. Effect power ranged from 7.9% for the birth season on learning (p < 0.05) to 38.8% for birth moon phase on mood (p < 0.001). CATPCA suggests the percentage of variance explained by a four-dimension-model (comprising the dimensions of response type, mood, response intensity and learning capabilities), is 75.9%. CATREG suggests environmental predictors explain 28.8% of the variability of response type, 37.0% of mood, and 37.5% of response intensity, and learning capabilities.

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“…In birds and cows, for example, daily changes in melatonin and corticosterone are lost during the days of the full moon. It has been suggested that the secretion of neurohormones may be triggered by electromagnetic radiation and/or the gravitational force of the moon [11][12][13].…”

Section: The Effect Of the Moon And Planets On The Biological Clockmentioning

confidence: 99%

External Factors that Direct the Biological Clock and Role in Treatment of Disease

Alemdar¹

2018

Arch Med

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Lunar Cycle Influences Spontaneous Delivery in Cows

Cited by 24 publications

References 23 publications

Daily calving frequency and preterm calving is not associated with lunar cycle but preterm calving is associated with weather conditions in Japanese Black cows

Daily calving frequency and preterm calving is not associated with lunar cycle but preterm calving is associated with weather conditions in Japanese Black cows

Can Donkey Behavior and Cognition Be Used to Trace Back, Explain, or Forecast Moon Cycle and Weather Events?

External Factors that Direct the Biological Clock and Role in Treatment of Disease

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