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Prairie Swine Centre is an affiliate of the University of Saskatchewan
Prairie Swine Centre is grateful for the assistance of the George Morris Centre in developing the economics portion of Pork Insight.
Financial support for the Enterprise Model Project and Pork Insight has been provided by:
Discrimination learning based on relative size concepts in horses (Equus caballus)
Posted in: Welfare by admin on January 1, 2003 | No Comments
This study explored whether or not horses could respond to stimuli using a concept based on relative size. In experiment 1, after learning to respond to the larger of the two stimuli for six sets of two-dimensional (2D) training exemplars, one horse was tested for size transposition that used novel larger an smaller stimuli as well as three-dimensional (3D) objects (5 2D sets and 5 3D sets with large, medium, small, and tiny sizes). The horse correctly chose the larger of two stimuli regardless of novelty or dimension or combination. In Experiment 2, two additional horses were tested using a subset of the stimuli from Experiment 1. One horse was required to select the larger stimuli as in Experiment 1 and the other the smaller stimuli. After learning the task, both horses responded correctly to new stimuli and showed size transposition. These results suggest that at least some horses are capable of solving problems based on relative size concepts. Moreover, they are capable to generalize across situations that vary from flat, black shapes to objects of different materials and colors including balls, flowers pots, and PVC connectors. These findings support earlier research that showed that horses could categorize certain stimuli, and provide new evidence that they are capable of using some form of concept for problem solving. Understanding that horses have more advanced learning abilities than was previously believed should help improve training methods and management.
Assessment of equine temperament by a questionnaire survey to caretakers and evaluation of its reliability by simultaneous behaviour test.
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In this study, a questionnaire was given to the caretakers of 86 riding horses to assess their impressions of the horses’ temperaments. Based on the temperament scores three factors were named to describe the data: ‘anxiety’, ‘novelty seeking’ and ‘understanding’. The same horses were subjected to a balloon reactivity test. Each horse was placed in a novel arena where its reaction to two balloons that were suspended from the ceiling and rotated was recorded. The horse’s behaviour and heart rate were recorded for the 5-minute test period. When the results of the questionnaire and the results of the reactivity test were compared, it was found that the horses that were labelled as anxious by the caretakers also had higher heart rates and defecated more during the test. Horses that were assessed as having problems with ordinary care and/or training also had increased heart rate and defecation during the balloon test. The temperament determined based on the questionnaire was highly consistent with the results of the balloon reactivity test. Based on these results, it appears that the temperament of the horse could accurately be assessed using a questionnaire survey.
Recognition of people by dairy calves using colour of clothing.
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The objective of this study was to determine whether dairy calves can discriminate among people based on the colour of their clothing. For six days a week, a familiar rewarder, who always wore the same coloured clothing, fed, patted and spoke gently to the calves while they were in their individual pen. The calves were then tested in a Y-maze, and had to make a choice: if they went to the familiar person, they received a milk reward. The calves did not receive anything, when they did not make the correct choice. The calves were tested eight times. Four experiments were conducted. In the first experiment, the familiar rewarder was in one arm of the maze (which was randomized), but the other arm was empty. Eleven of the 14 calves tested successfully completed the test. In the second experiment, a new group of calves were tested to determine if they could successfully discriminate between the familiar rewarder (wearing same clothes as during the familiarization period) and a stranger (wearing different coloured clothes). All calves successfully completed this test. The third experiment tested whether calves could discriminate between the rewarder and non-rewarder when they were both wearing clothes of the same colour. None of the calves were successful during this test. In the fourth experiment, the rewarder and non-rewarder wore clothes of the same colour, but they were a different colour than what was worn during the familiarization period. Only one calf was successful. The results indicate that colour cues are used by young calves to distinguish between people. The Y-maze is a useful method to use when studying the discriminatory abilities of calves.
THE PIG FARM MANAGER FOR MODELLING PIG PRODUCTION SYSTEMS
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Everything Old Is New Again – Sow Housing
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Danish pig production has increased considerably since Denmark became a member of the European Community in 1972. As of 2000 about 85% was exported to over 100 countries. Recently the European Union made group-housing systems for gestating sows mandatory. The Danish act on sow housing includes group housing from four weeks after service until seven days before farrowing, specific space requirements, solid floors, and a cooling system. Simple group housing systems are relatively cheap but offer little control over sows feed intake, lower the live born pigs, and some sows lose body condition and must be removed. Electric sow feeding systems (ESF) allow sows to be individually fed while residing in groups. Early trials churned out negative results, some including increased risk of abortion, loss of embryos, and higher mastitis incidence in gilts. A high transition period plagued the industry with a 1 to 1.5 year adjustment of herd and management to group housing (which can lead to reduced productivity and an increased cull rate). The Danish Applied Pig Research Scheme (DAPR) developed a set of recommendations for ESF: pen design should have a separate eating and dunging area, lying area should accommodate all sows comfortably, straw must be provided in the lying area, must have 1.1 to 1.3 m2 per sow, and more. They all help to minimize productivity loss when adapting to the ESF. Free access stalls are low tech and becoming popular. They are more expensive because one stall is required for each individual but it provides individual control over feed intake.
Estimating Genetic Merit
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In estimating the genetic merit of an animal, breeders are trying to determine the animal’s value as a parent, its breeding value. The phenotype of an animal (the traits we see and measure) is a combination of genetic and environmental effects. Genetic effects are the result of the genes inherited from parents. Environmental effects are the result of conditions the animal experienced, such as level of nutrition, stocking density, temperature, or health status.
The challenge to the breeder is to determine how much of an animal’s superiority (or inferiority) for a trait is due to additive genetic effects, since this is what will be passed on to its progeny through its own genes. Defining what constitutes genetic merit is an important first step in this process. This will be discussed further in NSIF-FS9, “Multiple Trait Selection for Pork Improvement,” but genetic merit can be defined as how an animal ranks, relative to other selection candidates, for its ability to produce superior offspring.
Favorable performance for a characteristic is an obvious way to rank animals; however, it should be done relative to other animals that are of similar age and housed and raised under similar conditions. It is best to compare an animal’s performance record to the average of the group of animals that they were raised with. This can be done by calculating performance deviations from the group average or the ratio of animal’s performance with the group average. For example, a gilt has an average daily gain of 1.9 lb/day for the grow-finish period while the other gilts of similar age and raised in the same building averaged 1.8 lb/day for average daily gain. The gilt in question would have a performance deviation of 0.1 lb/day, which is favorable and a ratio of 105.6 (1.9/1.8). This is the first step in evaluating an animal’s genetic merit for performance characteristics. For further examples see Table 1.
Two terms are often used in discussing genetic merit. The first term, Estimated Breeding Value (EBV) is the estimated genetic merit of animal, expressed as a deviation. The second term, Expected Progeny Difference (EPD) is one-half an animal’s Estimated Breeding Value and can be used to determine the expected performance change of progeny if the animal in question is used as a parent. Methods to estimate genetic merit in swine have evolved considerably this century. As breeders have been able to incorporate increasing amounts of information to assess an animal’s breeding value, methods have grown from simple visual appraisal to complex statistical techniques. The purpose of this fact sheet is to discuss these alternative methods.
Structure of the Global Markets for Meat
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Ammonia, Volatile Fatty Acids, Phenolics, and Odor Offensiveness in Manure from Growing Pigs Fed Diets Reduced in Protein Concentration
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The objective of this study was to investigate whether reducing dietary crude protein (CP) concnetration decreases fecal volatile fatty acis (VFA), manure ammonia, emission and odor and fecal urinary phenolic metobilities. Six barrows were alotted on of 6 dietary treatments in a Latin square deisgn. Treatments consisted of four corn-soybean meal based diets containing 15, 12, 9, and 6% crude protein, a caesin based diet containing 15% CP and a protein free diet. The caesin based and prtoein free diet were used to determine basal endogenous contribution of VFA, phenolics, ammonia and manure odor. Pigs were housed individually in metabolsim crates to allow total collection of faeces and urine. Feaces and urine were analyzed for VFA and phenolic metabolite concentrations, respectively. Faeces and urine were then mixed, stored and fermented at room temperature for 30 days. For ammonia determination, headspace air was sampled from manur slurries at 24, 48, and 72 hours after fermentation. Slurry samples were placed into vials, capped and randomized before odor panel evaluation. Odor effensiveness was classified on severity 1 – non-offensive and 5 – extremely offensive. Reucing CP increased VFA concentrations but did not effect phenolic concentrations in the urine. Manur ammonia emission was reduced as dietary CP concentration decreased from 15-0%. The 15% diet had the least offensive manure with odor qualitative ranking of 2.58. Compared with the 15% CP diet, manure from the 9 and 6% CP diet was found to be more offesnive with odor qualitative rankings of 2.92 and 3.10 respectively. Odor qualitative rank for th 12% CP, potein free,and casein based diets did not differ from the 15% CP iet. These results indicate that recution in dietary CP concentrations decreases ammonia emissions but doesn’t reduce odor offesniveness.