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MANFRED ANKE AN. R. ACAD. NAC. FARM.

Deficiency goats suffered pain in the extremities, swollen forefoot
tarsal joints, and skeletal deformations in the forelegs (5). In goats
with vanadium deficiency, glandular or glandulocystic hyperplasia
of the endometrium was observed (83). The sizes of the pancreas,
thymus and thyroid of vanadium-deficient goats were insignificantly
increased in comparison to the same tissues of control goats (21).

Already Uthus and Nielsen (125) and Nielsen (90) reported that
a vanadium-deficiency nutrition of rats showed increased thyroid
weights and thyroid-to-body weight ratios, and decreased growth.
This study also showed that stress factors, which change the thyroid
status or iodine metabolism, enhance the response to vanadium de-
privation.

Vanadium may well be found essential for some enzyme reactio-
ns, perhaps one that is involved in thyroid metabolism.

Feeding of the V-deficiency ration reduced life expectancy sig-
nificantly. Within the first year, 43% of the animals of a group
without V supplementation died, compared to only 11% in the con-
trol group. At the end of the experiment, 16% of the control goats
were still alive, whereas only 3% of the V-deficient goats survived
(Table 19).

TABLE 19. Influence of vanadium deficiency on the mortality of goats

Period and number Control Vanadium- p
of goats which died goats deficient goats
(n; n) %
%

1st year (7;31) 11 43 < 0.001
2nd year (17;22) 27 31 > 0.05
3rd year (14;10) 21 13 > 0.05
4th year (13;4) 20 6 < 0.05
5th year (2;2) 3 3 > 0.05
> 5 years (1;1) 2 1 > 0.05

Goats surviving (10;2) 16 3 < 0.001

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