Chilled and post-thawed semen characteristics of buffalo semen diluted in tris extender enriched with date palm pollen grains (TPG)

ObjectiveThe benefits of dates palm and their pollen grains in the human nourishment system have their consideration and importance in medical and nutritional point of view. The present study aimed to investigate a new perspective for the use of date palm pollen grains (DPPG) aqueous extract or infusion in preservation of chilled and frozen buffalo semen.MethodsPooled buffalo semen were diluted by Tris-Citrate-Fructose egg yolk (TCFY) diluent (considered as control) and diverse concentrations of clarified soaked pollen grains in Tris-Citrate-Fructose (TCF) diluent in concentrations of 50, 100, 150, 200 and 250 mg DPPG/5 mL TCF. Five concentrations were kept without egg yolk (TPG) while other five concentrations contained 20% egg yolk (TPGY). Each of the two dilutions was enumerated according to the concentration of DPPG. Extended semen is then chilled (for 7 d) and cryopreserved. Motility, alive sperm and intact sperm membrane (HOST) % were recorded as characteristic sperm parameters.ResultsAfter 7 d of chilling, significant (P < 0.000 1) high percent of motile sperms was recorded for TPG 50, 100, 150, 200 and 250 (66.67, 65.00, 61.67, 61.67 and 63.33, respectively). After freeze thawing, TPGY 150 and 250 showed the significant (P < 0.000 1) high percent of motile sperms (43.75 and 45.00, respectively) while TPGY 100, 200, 250 and TPG 50, 150 revealed the high results concerning HOST (80.61, 83.99, 80.61, 88.33 and 83.33, respectively) whereas the highest alive sperm percentage was recorded with TPGY 150 (96.30) compared to the control.ConclusionsThe aqueous cold infusion or extract of the DPPG, added to the TCF extender with or without the addition of egg yolk, proved its good preserving and maintaining capacity of chilled and thawed buffalo bull sperms which was expressed mainly by the sperm motility.