{"id":8147,"date":"2011-08-04T20:26:09","date_gmt":"2011-08-04T20:26:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/prairieswine.com\/rsc\/?p=8147"},"modified":"2011-11-25T21:35:16","modified_gmt":"2011-11-25T21:35:16","slug":"head-only-followed-by-cardiac-arrest-electrical-stunning-is-an-effective-alternative-to-head-only-electrical-stunning-in-pigs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/prairieswine.com\/rsc\/head-only-followed-by-cardiac-arrest-electrical-stunning-is-an-effective-alternative-to-head-only-electrical-stunning-in-pigs\/","title":{"rendered":"Head-only followed by cardiac arrest electrical stunning is an effective alternative to head-only electrical stunning in pigs"},"content":{"rendered":"

Many small slaughter facilities use head-only electrical stunning to render swine unconscious and insensible to pain before slaughter. Head only electrical stunning is a reversible procedure that is optimally effective for approximately 15 s after stun completion. In many small North American slaughter plants, the authors have observed hoist speeds that are too slow to achieve a short enough stun-to-bleed interval to maintain insensibility through exsanguination. Unlike many European plants, there is no separate high speed hoist for pigs and exsanguination on the floor is not condoned. As a result, a 2-stage stunning method was proposed where head-only stunning for 3 s was immediately followed by application of the same stunning wand to the cardiac region of the animal for 3 s while lying in lateral recumbancy. A paired-comparison study was conducted on 89 pigs in a small slaughter facility to compare the head-only method applied for 6 s with the head\/heart method. The objective was to evaluate signs of return to sensibility, stun-to-bleed time, blood lactate concentration, muscle pH, drip loss, and fresh meat color to validate the head\/heart electrical stunning method for small slaughter plants. Incidence of corneal reflex was not different between head\/heart (93.8%) and head only (85%) stunning. Nose twitching was more common in head only (26.5%) than head\/heart (5%) stunning. Head\/ heart stunning eliminated rhythmic breathing, natural blinking, eye tracking to moving objects, and righting reflex, which were all observed in head-only stunned pigs. Eye tracking to moving objects was observed in 40.8% of head-only stunned pigs. Blood lactate was not different between stunning methods (head only: 8.8mmol\/L, head\/heart: 7.8mmol\/L). Stun-to-bleed time did not differ (head only: 32s, head\/heart: 33s). Mean time to loss of heartbeat with the head-only method was 121s. No heartbeat was observed with the head\/heart method. Longissimus thoracis pH, color, and drip loss were not different between stunning methods. This study determined that the head\/heart electrical stunning method reduces the incidence of signs of return to sensibility without significant effects on meat quality, plant operation speed, or blood lactate concentration. In addition, the head\/heart method requires no capital investment for plants that are currently using the head-only method.<\/p>\n

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For more information the full article can be found at http:\/\/jas.fass.org\/<\/a><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Many small slaughter facilities use head-only electrical stunning to render swine unconscious and insensible to pain before slaughter. Head only electrical stunning is a reversible procedure that is optimally effective for approximately 15 s after stun completion. In many small North American slaughter plants, the authors have observed hoist speeds that are too slow to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2102,930,928],"tags":[8882,2096,640,13816,8058,2817,6988,4564,19644,4663,11827,10929,171,20007,8396,11374,8456,8059,9846,94,10859,7545,3465,14,22789,33,16262,95,26351,1533,76,85,35,20911,6053,27281],"class_list":["post-8147","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-meat-quality","category-production","category-welfare","tag-al","tag-alternative","tag-animal","tag-ass","tag-cardiac-arrest","tag-cla","tag-color","tag-comparison","tag-dd","tag-don","tag-electric-stunning-and-blood-lactate-in-swine","tag-electrical-stunning-pigs-meat-quality","tag-floor","tag-gh","tag-head-heart-stun","tag-head-to-heart-stun-pig","tag-heart-stunning","tag-insensibility","tag-lee","tag-meat","tag-nat","tag-optimal","tag-pea","tag-pig","tag-pig-stunning-impedance","tag-pigs","tag-pl","tag-quality","tag-return-to-sensibility","tag-size","tag-slaughter","tag-stunning","tag-swine","tag-t","tag-use","tag-welfare"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/prairieswine.com\/rsc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8147","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/prairieswine.com\/rsc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/prairieswine.com\/rsc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/prairieswine.com\/rsc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/prairieswine.com\/rsc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8147"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/prairieswine.com\/rsc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8147\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10511,"href":"http:\/\/prairieswine.com\/rsc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8147\/revisions\/10511"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/prairieswine.com\/rsc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8147"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/prairieswine.com\/rsc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8147"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/prairieswine.com\/rsc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8147"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}