The social environment influences the behavioural responses of beef cattle to handling.

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Cattle responses to handling are probably not only a reaction to human, but also depend on other elements of the situation such as social context, physical environment, and the novelty of the situation. In particular, the social context may be important for cattle, which, in common with other species of domestic ungulates, are very gregarious. As handling can be stressful for farm animals, it can be hypothesised that social partners modify individual responses to handling. The present study investigated the effect of the presence or absence of social partners on behavioural reactions of beef calves in a handling test. At the age of 10 months, 38 calves from two breeds (Salers and Limousine) were individually subjected to the docility test (reactions to handling), once while in visual contact with four familiar peers, and once in the absence of peers. The docility test procedure included physical separation from peers (30 s; period 1), exposition to a stationary human (30 s; period 2), and handling by human (30 s to 2.5 min, according to the success in handling; period 3). In absence of human (period 1), calves in visual contact with their peers spent more time motionless than when peers were totally absent. The social environment also influenced the duration of handling (period 3); the human required more time to successfully handle calves when peers were present. In conclusion, the results of this study show that the presence of peers affects individual calves’ reactions to docility test.

Aversion learning techniques to evaluate dairy cattle handling practices.

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This paper evaluates a technique to assess the aversiveness of handling procedures in cattle. Cattle were moved through a chute or race to an area where the handling practices were performed. This process was repeated 9-12 times depending on the trial. It was expected, and confirmed, that the dairy cows would become hesitant to enter the race, would move more slowly, and require more force to be moved if the treatment they received was unpleasant or aversive. In the first study cows the ranking of treatments studied was, from most aversive to least, hitting and shouting, brushing, control (no handling), and a food reward. In the second study the most aversive treatments were an electric prod and shouting, compared to control, while hitting and a tail twist were intermediate. In the final study, using what were believed to be positive handling practices, no differences were found among hand feeding, gentling, and control. The authors conclude that this test is useful to identify aversive versus positive procedures, but is not very sensitive to differentiate among either positive or negative procedures.

Comparison of methods for isolating Salmonella bacteria from faeces of naturally infected pigs

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Strain differences in aggressiveness of male domestic fowl in response to a model.

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Longitudinal changes in bronchial responsiveness associated with swine confinement dust exposure.

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The demand for straw and feathers as litter substrates by laying hens.

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The consumer demand theory, relating to the elasticity of demand, is now being incorporated into behavioural demands and environmental requirements of farm animals. Laying hens have been found to have an inelastic demand for various types of floor litter such as sand, peat or wood shavings. The demand of other types of litter, feathers and straw, have yet to be studied, thus this study set out to determine the elasticity of the demand for the said types of litter. Every second day for one hour, the hens had to peck at a key a certain number of times, after which they received a reward, access to either straw or feathers. All the laying hens were willing to work for access to straw, while only three were willing to work for access to the feathers. Dustbathing was not consistently performed in either of the two types of litter. Even though the hens did not use the access to straw to dustbathe, the study still found that they have a high demand for access to this form of litter.

Struggling behavior in shackled male and female broiler chickens.

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It has been suggested, based on anecdotal evidence, that when shackled broiler chickens struggle, it is due to the discomfort associated with compression of the shank. Birds with larger shanks seem to struggle more violently than birds with smaller shanks. The size of the leg gap is not adjustable. The hypothesis of this study was that males would struggle more than females, as they tend to be larger and have thicker shanks than females. The following data was collected for males and females during a one-minute period when the birds were first shackled: latencies to struggle, numbers of struggling bouts, and total time spent struggling. Each test bird was measured for body weight and circumference of the right shank. The results indicated that male birds were heavier and had larger shanks than females. The males also struggled sooner and longer than females. When the data for males and females was pooled, there was a negative correlation between latency to struggle and shank size and a positive correlation between struggling behaviour and shank size. However, there were no correlations within sex. Body weight was not correlated with any of the struggling behaviour measures. The authors concluded that male broilers may struggle more than females due to the use of shackles that have leg gaps that do not adjust to fit larger shanks.

Effects of heat stress on the antimicrobial drug resistance of Escherichia coli of the intestinal flora of swine

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The effects of heat stress
on the antimicrobial drug resistance of Escherichia coli of the intestinal tract of swine were
studied in animals from a farm that had not been supplementing antimicrobials in feed for
the past 10 years. In one study, 10 A

Recent developments in stunning of poultry.

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Play behaviour in group housed dairy calves, the effect of space allowance.

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Under natural or semi-natural conditions, play in calves is typically seen in a social context either as locomotor play or play fighting. Play behaviour has been suggested to be an indicator of good welfare in wild as well as captive juveniles and has been used to assess welfare in different farm environments. In dairy calves kept in pens, lack of sufficient space may inhibit the performance of play behaviour. The present study investigated, firstly, if an increase in space allowance increases the occurrence of play behaviour, and secondly, if calves kept at a low space allowance perform more locomotory play when released individually in a large novel area. A total of 96 dairy calves in six repetitions were housed in groups of four, in pens of either 4, 3, 2.2 or 1.5 m2 per calf from 2 weeks of age. The occurrence of play behaviour in the home environment was recorded continuously for each individual calf during 24 h at 5, 7 and 9 weeks of age. Locomotor play decreased over the weeks (54, 29 and 19 s for weeks 5, 7 and 9 respectively). At 5 weeks of age, calves kept at 4 or 3 m2 per calf performed more locomotor play in the home environment than calves kept at 2.2 or 1.5 m2 per calf. However at 7 and 9 weeks of age no effects of space allowance was found. In addition, the duration of locomotor play was recorded for all calves during an individual 10-min open-field test at 4 and 10 weeks of age. During the open-field test at 10 weeks of age, calves from pens with 1.5 m2 per calf performed more locomotory play than calves on the remaining space allowance treatments. The present study shows that an increase in the available space increases the occurrence of locomotor play in the home environment at 5 weeks of age. It also shows that calves kept in pens with the smallest space allowance performed more locomotor play behaviour when released in a large arena at 10 weeks of age. In summary, an effect of space allowance on early locomotor play was found in calves kept in groups. Under the hypothesis that performance of play associated with positive feelings, increasing space above the minimum requirement of 1.5 m2 per calf to 3.0 m2 per calf in pens with four calves is of significance to the welfare of the animals.