On-Farm Welfare Audits

Posted in: Pork Insight Articles, Welfare by admin on April 1, 2008 | No Comments

Animal welfare improves productivity, but has also been increasingly demanded by the consumer. Having a reliable Quality Assurance Scheme based on on-farm welfare audits allows governments to enforce legislation, producers to objectively monitor conditions, and marketers to inform consumers on the animal welfare for specific products. Welfare requirements can be based on natural living, which bases welfare on the type of production system used, or biological functioning, which focuses more on the animal health. The Five Freedoms are UK welfare guidelines, and introduce mental welfare through requiring freedom from fear and stress, and to express natural behaviour. Practical welfare audits need to be performed quickly, and may not always be able to incorporate complex mental welfare assessments. Direct animal-based, and indirect resource-based measures are mainly used in actual audits. Some of the indirect measures taken in an audit are the feeders and drinkers per pig, air temperature, minimum space allowance, and pharmaceutical use. Some of the direct measures commonly used are body condition scores and skin lesion scores for a sample of the herd. Freedom to express normal behaviour is a hard welfare requirement to measure. The presence of vices and stereotyped behaviour can indicate it is not being met, and the need for environmental enrichment is starting to be recognized. QA schemes are now a requirement for the UK market, but specialized QA schemes, like Freedom Food introduced by the RSPCA, have additional welfare requirements. The EU has recently developed a new welfare project that includes focus on animal-based measures, and it is currently in a pilot-stage. Good welfare standards benefit everyone in the industry, and on-farm audits are useful to assess animal welfare.

The Welfare of Sheep: Review of Recent Literature

Posted in: Pork Insight Articles, Welfare by admin on February 7, 2008 | No Comments

Sheep production has generally been free from criticism on welfare issues as most sheep are extensively managed and lambs remain with their mothers from several weeks before weaning. Sheep production is a relatively minor portion of animal agriculture and has not attracted as much attention as other species in North America. In regions of the world in which sheep represent a major industry, several welfare issues have been the focus of recent research.

Castration and tail docking are procedures used in several species, but are of particular relevance to welfare studies of sheep as each may be performed using several procedures. Shearing, with its restraint and use of noisy, hot shears represents a common and repeated fear evoking procedure throughout the industry. The handling, transportation and slaughter of sheep is also a major welfare concern.

This article reviews the recent literature with respect to welfare issues in sheep.

The Welfare of Poultry: Review of Recent Literature

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Poultry production represents a very large and diverse. There are many facets of production, and hence many areas that are potential concern for the welfare of the animals involved. These areas may include, among others, housing of laying hens, beak trimming, toe clipping, spent hen disposal, molting of laying hens, feed restriction, lighting programs, growth rates and resulting effects of chicken and turkey broilers, transportation, pre-slaughter management, slaughter, and handling (Mench and Siegel, 1997).  This article reviews recent literature on the welfare of poultry.

The Welfare of Pigs: Review of Recent Literature

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Animal welfare issues pertaining to pig farming are diverse, and scientific efforts to address these issues have resulted in a plethora of new literature. This review consolidates and summarizes this literature in an effort to provide a better understanding of pig welfare. Considerable attention has been given to housing design, husbandry and transportation of pigs.

The Welfare of Horses: Review of Recent Literature

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Horses serve a number of functions throughout different parts of the world. They are the work animals in a number of third world countries, food livestock to specific countries, and are companion animals to many people in developed nations.  The welfare of horses has been an issue in North America since 1641, when the Massachusetts Bay Colony included horses in legislation prohibiting cruelty to animals (Stuff, 1996).  This article reviews literature on various
Horse related welfare articles. 

The Welfare of Cattle: Review of Recent Literature

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The cattle industry in Canada comprises three main enterprises: dairy, veal and beef production.  This literature review touches base on topics such as Transport, Slaughter, Lameness, Painful Procedures, Reproductive Technology, Bovine and Somatotropin (BST).

Effects of shaded versus unshaded wallows on behavior, performance, and physiology of the outdoor lactating sow

Posted in: Welfare by admin on January 1, 2008 | No Comments

The objectives of this study were to determine the effects of shading wallows during the summer months on lactating sow behavior, performance, and physiology. A total of 128 sows were used during warm weather (May to August 2001) to determine the effects of unshaded (control; n = 8) vs. shaded (SH; n = 8) wallows. Sows ranged over 6 parities and were fed a completely balanced sorghum-based diet. Behavioral data were collected by 15-min scan samples over a 24-h
period/wk for a total of 16 wk. All sows were observed twice when litter age was 5 and 15 d, respectively. Respiration rates (breaths/min) were collected on 50 sows (control, n = 25; SH, n = 25) over an 8-wk period when the maximum temperature exceeded 32°C. Ten milliliters of clotted blood and 20 mL of whole blood were obtained by jugular puncture from each sow on the day of weaning to determine total white blood cells, acute phase proteins, packed-cell volume, and chemotaxis and chemokinesis. Descriptive water temperature profiles were measured by using data loggers positioned at 3 levels per wallow: surface water, shallow mud, and deep mud. Behavioral, postural, location, performance, and physiological measurements did not differ (P > 0.05) among wallow treatments. Regardless of treatment, sows spent approximately 82% of their total time budget inside the farrowing hut and only approximately
7% of their total time budget in the wallow. A total of 428 piglets died, 219 in the control treatment and 209 in the SH treatment. The majority of piglets in both treatments died of crushing within the first 72 h after parturition, and most of the piglets had suckled. Shade kept the shallow water profile cooler during the hotter afternoon temperatures compared with the control wallows. In SH for both the shallow and deep mud profiles, temperatures were consistent throughout the day. In conclusion, sows spent a large percentage of their daily time budget inside the farrowing hut and spent only
brief episodes in the wallow. Shading the wallow did not result in increased wallow use time or improvements in sow physiology and overall performance. 

For more information the full article can be found at http://jas.fass.org/

Coated fatty acids alter virulence properties of Salmonella Typhimurium and decrease intestinal colonization of pigs

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The aim of the present study was to determine whether some frequently used short- (SCFA) and medium-chain fatty acids (MCFA) are able to alter virulence gene expression and to decrease Salmonella Typhimurium colonization and shedding in pigs using well established and controlled in vitro and in vivo assays. It was found that when given as feed supplement to pigs experimentally infected with Salmonella Typhimurium, coated butyric acid decreased the levels of faecal shedding and intestinal colonization, but had no influence on the colonization of tonsils, spleen and liver. Uncoated fatty acids, however, did not influence fecal shedding, intestinal or tonsillar colonization in pigs. In conclusion, supplementing feed with certain coated fatty acids, such as butyric acid, may help to reduce the Salmonella load in pigs.

For more information the full article can be found at http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/journal/03781135

Pigs’ preferences for rooting materials measured in a three-choice maze-test

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The aim of this experiment was to investigate pigs’ preferences for rooting materials. Eighteen materials
were allocated to six categories each of which consisted of three similar materials based on characteristics such
as structure, size of particles,complexity, destructibility and digestibility.Twelve pairs of pigs chose among the
three materials of each of the six categories in a balanced design.Within each category each pair was given four
instantaneous choices among the three materials in a three-armed maze. ‘No choice’ was scored if the pigs did
not enter one of the maze-arms within 90 s. Thus there were four options in each choice situation. The results
were analysed using a random utility model incorporating random intercepts to account for the repeated testing
of the same animals. The pigs expressed clear preferences within the category EARTH,where compost and peat
were preferred to wood-shavings and no choice. In the category CHIP the most probable rank-order was spruce
chip, willow chip, fir chip and no choice, while in the category ROUGH the most probable rank-order was
maize-silage, grass silage, sugar beets and no choice.However, in these two categories none of the probabilities
were sufficiently large to signify a preference for any of the three materials although the probabilities of the ‘no
choice’ option were low.The pigs expressed no preferences among any of the four options including ‘no choice’
in the categories TOY(sisal robe, Bite-Rite,wooden beam),HAY(alfalfa hay mixed with straw, seed grass hay,
barley straw with under-seed), and STRAW (long straw, chopped straw and straw pellets).

For more information the full article can be found at http://journals.elsevierhealth.com/periodicals/applan/issues

Consumer Preferences for Animal Welfare Attributes: The Case of Gestation Crates

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The objectives of this study are to 1) estimate consumer willingness-to-pay for alternative pork production practice attributes including use of gestation crates; 2) examine if these preferences are related to preferences for farm size and country-of-origin attributes; 3) evaluate if banning use of gestation crates may be justified on grounds of economic welfare enhancement; and 4) identify the distribution of welfare impacts of gestation crate bans across consumers. Mixed logit and latent class models are employed to investigate the extent of consumer preference heterogeneity influencing conclusions to theses individual objectives. In our analysis, if a consumer is provided with adequate labeling of pork produced on farms certified to voluntarily not use gestation crates, we find no economic support justifying a ban on the use of gestation crates that impacts all consumers. The results of this analysis imply that the desires (and corresponding voting behavior) of these consumers have substantial impacts on the consumer welfare of all consumers whose food product choice set is impacted. Also, the swine industry may benefit by encouraging additional labeling of products originating from producers voluntarily choosing not to utilize gestation crates. If these products are currently not widely available to consumers, results of this study suggest that additional labeling may, in addition to seizing market opportunities, potentially help alleviate some of the increasing pressure for production practice changes associated with gestation crates.