Seasonal variations in the food consumption of woodchucks (Marmota monax).
Food consumption of 155 woodchucks ( Marmota monax ) was measured immediately after capture to determine whether a seasonal rhythm obtained in feeding of a natural population. Food intake of adults was lowest in March. It reached a maximum in May, then declined through the summer; some individuals increased food intake temporarily in late autumn. Comparative ata from a laboratory colony showed that a similar rhythm occurred under conditions of constant temperature and photoperiod. Variability in food consumption axima associated with different age groups, considered in the context of vailable life history information, suggested that the rhythm had a period omewhat less than 1 year.
Endocrine correlates of hibernation-independent gonadal recrudescence and the limited late-winter breeding season in woodchucks, Marmota monax.
Woodchucks (Marmota monax) normally experience gonadal recrudescence towards the end of a 4-5 month hibernation, emerge in late winter, immediately breed in a short 3-week breeding season, and have regressed gonads before the next hibernation. Our studies of wild and captive animals show that fertile females give birth to single litters after a 32-day gestation and their breeding season is terminated by a reactivation of the corpora lutea of pregnancy for 1-3 months immediately postpartum. In nonbred females the breeding season is likewise terminated by spontaneous luteinization of the ovaries for 1-3 months shortly after the vernal equinox. Tests regress and testosterone declines during and after the breeding season. Circannual reproductive cycles persist in the absence of hibernation and are shortened to 9-10 months after 3-5 years of a 12L:12D photoperiod. Unique aspects of this species that merit endocrine investigation include descent/retraction of testes, transient luteolysis at parturition, superactivation of postpartum corpora lutea, regulation of the pituitary-gonadal axis by an annual endogenous metabolic cycle entrained to the annual change in photoperiod, and the hormonal basis of hibernation.
A Phenomenological Study of the Wind Band Experience: Stories of Band
A PHENOMENOLOGICAL STUDY OF THE WIND BAND EXPERIENCE: