Persian Goitered Gazelle
Gazella subgutturosa subgutturosa
Order: Artiodactyla Family: Bovidae
1) General Zoological Data
In contrast to most other gazelles, goitered gazelles possess horns only in males. These gazelles inhabit desert areas from Palestine to Northern China and have become severely reduced in numbers by hunting. A related species, the Sand gazelle (Gazella subgutturosa marica) has previously had a chapter (see Sand gazelle chapter, as the chapters overlap).
"The goitered gazelle, Gazella subgutturosa, inhabits desert and sub-desert steppes of the Arabian peninsula and southwestern Asia to northern China and Mongolia. Four subspecies are recognized by Groves (1985), two of which are presently maintained in captivity in North America. The Arabian sand gazelle (see chapter on Sand gazelle), G. s. marica, was once common in the Arabian peninsula, ranging north through eastern Jordan and Iraq, where its range integrated with that of G. s. subgutturosa, commonly known as the Persian or goitered gazelle. Persian gazelles once ranged from eastern Turkey through Iran, Pakistan and Soviet Central Asia. The two forms that are not maintained in North American collections are the Xinjiang goitered gazelle, G. s. yarkandensis, found in the deserts of the Tarim Basin, Xinjiang, China, and the Mongolian goitered gazelle G. s. hilleriana, native to the Gobi and Caidam (Groves, 1985, see Fig. 1). The only captive records of these forms are from European collections. These records indicate that G. s. hilleriana specimens were present in the Opel Zoo as recently as the 1970's, while four G. s. yarkandensis were held by the Berlin Zoo from 1904 to 1906."
This information has been taken from the sand gazelle studbook report's initial statement (Carter & Kingswood, 1991). Relatively small colonies of sand gazelles are now held in a few zoos, both in Europe and in the USA. In addition, it has apparently been difficult to differentiate clearly between the different phenotypes of these gazelles by mere inspection of the four subspecies, if this is possible at all. This is also apparent from the two photographs shown in the chapter on sand gazelles. Perhaps specific phenotypes have special, as yet unrecognized chromosomal characteristics as well. I am not aware that such comparisons (karyotypes with photographs) have ever been attempted. Rostron (1972) did a careful study of skull measurements of Arabian gazelles and thereby assigned species designation.
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14) Immunology
I am not aware of any studies in this field.
15) Pathological features
Griner (1983) did not differentiate the various types of gazelles and found that, among "Persian gazelles", the primary cause of death was trauma and neonates had "malnutrition" as major problems..
16) Physiologic data
Some data (hematologic and chemical) are available for Sand gazelles (see that chapter), but none have been gathered for the present species.
17) Other resources
The research department (CRES) of the Zoological Society of San Diego has had a long interest in the genetics of gazelles, and, especially in the polymorphism of goitered gazelles (Kingswood et al., 1994); thus, cell strains of numerous specimens of Persian gazelles and other related forms are available from CRES at the Zoological Society of San Diego by contacting Dr. Oliver Ryder at oryder@ucsd.edu.
There is a very extensive bibliography on all aspects of sand gazelles and their related forms. This has been gathered by the King Khalid Wildlife Research Center, Thumammah and can be made available by the National Commission for Wildlife Conservation and Development, P.O. Box 61681, Riyadh 11575, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
18) Other remarks - What additional Information is needed?
Early stages of implantation need to be observed, and more information on the length of the umbilical cord is needed.
Acknowledgement
The animal photograph in this chapter comes from the Zoological Society of San Diego. I appreciate also very much the help of the pathologists at the San Diego Zoo.
References
Carter, S. and Kingswood, S.: Goitered Gazelle. North American Regional Studbook First edition. Sedgwick County Zoo & Botanical Garden, Wichita, Kansas, 1991.
Effron, M., Bogart, M.H., Kumamoto, A.T. and Benirschke, K.: Chromosome studies in the mammalian subfamily Antilopinae. Genetica 46:419-444, 1976.
Granjon, L., Vassart, M., Greth, A. and Cribiu, E.-P.: Genetic study of sand gazelles (Gazella subgutturosa marica) from Saudi Arabia. Chromosomal and isozymic data. Z. Säugetierk. 56:169-176, 191.
Gray, A.P.: Mammalian Hybrids. A Check-list with Bibliography. 2nd edition. Commonwealth Agricultural Bureaux Farnham Royal, Slough, England, 1972.
Griner, L.A.: Pathology of Zoo Animals. Zoological Society of San Diego, San Diego, California, 1983.
Groves, C.P.: An introduction to the gazelles. Chinkara: Bulletin of the Gazelle Research Group. 1(1):4-16, 1985.
Hsu, T.C. and Benirschke, K.: An Atlas of Mammalian Chromosomes. Vol. 10, Folio 504, 1977.
Kingswood, S.C., Kumamoto, A.T., Sudman, P.D., Fletcher, K.C. and Greenbaum, I.F.: Meiosis in chromosomally heteromorphic goitered gazelle, Gazella subgutturosa (Artiodactyla, Bovidae). Chromosome Research 2:37-46, 1994.
Nowak, R.M.: Walker's Mammals of the World. 6th ed. The Johns Hopkins Press, Baltimore, 1999.
Orlov, in Shi, L.: Recent trends in mammalian cytogenetics in China. La Kromosoma II-45:1458-1467, 1987.
Rostron, J.: A multivariate statistical study the skull measurements of five taxa of gazelles. Biol. J. Linn. Soc. 4:1-14, 1972.
Sempere, A.J., Brown, N., Pereladova, O.B., Bahloul, K., Lacroix, A. and Soldatova, N.: Comparative analysis of reproductive cycles in female Persian gazelle (Gazella subgutturosa subgutturosa) (Central Asia) and sand gazelle (Gazella subgutturosa marica) (Arabian Peninsula). Gen. Comp. Endocrinol. 121:57-65, 2001.
Vassart M, Greth A, Durand V and Cribiu EP. Chromosomal polymorphism in sand gazelles (Gazella subgutturosa marica). J Heredity 84:478-481, 1993.
Vassart, M., Granjon, L. and Greth, A.: Genetic study of Gazella gazella: chromosomal and allozymic data. C. R. Acad. Sc. III 318:27-33, 1995.
Walther, F.: Die Gazellen und ihre Verwandten. In, Gzimeks Tierleben. Volume 13. Kindler-Verlag Zürich, 1968.
Wurster, D.H.: Sex-chromosome translocations and karyotypes in bovid tribes. Cytogenetics 11:197-207, 1972.
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