This paper constitutes a review on the welfare aspects of piglet castration that considers the scientific literature published after 2004. Castrating during the neonatal period (1 to 3 days of age) is clearly painful. In addition, inflammatory processes may take place at the sites of incision, thus adding further pain to the procedure. Surgical castration with general and local anaesthesia, in combination with long-term analgesia, has been shown to reduce pain but the additional handling and injection of the anaesthetic, the effectiveness and limited safety margins have to be thoroughly evaluated. Raising entire males during the whole fattening period or immunocastration of males towards the end of the fattening period are other alternatives with welfare benefits in young pigs compared to current surgical castration, but with some potential welfare drawbacks regarding handling stress and behaviour during fattening. Based on the current knowledge, it can be concluded that sperm sexing and raising entire males after genetic control of boar taint are potentially preferable alternatives to current practices, but need further research, as these methods are not yet available.
Many of the behavioral responses following acute bacterial or viral infection are now considered important for maintaining homeostasis during inflammation. In the present study, we extend this concept to pigs (16 crossbred barrows) by demonstrating that lipopolysaccharide (LPS, .5, 5, or 50 micrograms/kg BW) from Escherichia coli injected i.p. reduces feed intake, decreases activity, and elevates body temperature. To determine whether any of these effects could be mediated via a prostaglandin (PG)-dependent mechanism, a second experiment with 16 crossbred barrows was conducted. Barrows were pretreated with indomethacin (IND, 5 mg/kg BW [a cyclooxygenase inhibitor]), and their behavior and body temperature following a challenge i.p. injection of LPS (5 micrograms/kg BW) were assessed. Pretreatment with IND inhibited the anorexia and inactivity caused by LPS, suggesting that the behavioral effects of LPS are dependent on activation of a PG system. Lipopolysaccharide alone, however, did not elevate body temperature in this case; thus, the involvement of PGs in this response was not determined. Collectively, these data indicate that pigs respond to LPS by reducing feed intake, decreasing activity, and becoming febrile. The ability of IND to inhibit behavioral effects of LPS is consistent with the hypothesis that a PG system is involved in mediating sickness behavior. Perhaps, by altering the activity of cyclooxygenase it is possible to enhance or inhibit the behavioral symptoms of sickness in pigs.
Using a comparative approach, we investigated the ability of dwarf goats and sheep to use direct and indirect information about the location of a food reward in an object-choice task. Subjects had to choose between two cups with only one covering a reward. Before making a choice, subjects received information about the baited (direct information) or non-baited cup (indirect information). Both goats and sheep were able to use direct information (presence of food) in the object choice task. After controlling for local enhancement, we found that goats rather than sheep were able to use indirect information (i.e., the absence of food) to find a reward. The actual test setup could not clarify whether individual goats were able to inferentially reason about the content of the baited cup when only shown the content of the non-baited cup or if they simply avoided the empty cup in that situation. As browsing species, feral and wild goats exhibit highly selective feeding behaviour compared to the rather unselective grazing sheep. The potential influence of this species-specific foraging flexibility of goats and sheep for using direct and indirect information to find a food reward is discussed in relation to a higher aversion to losses in food acquisition in goats compared to sheep.
1. Movement (frequency of changes) between inside and outside housing areas, time spent in each area, tonic immobility (TI) and differential blood cell counts were studied in relation to feather condition in laying hens of two genotypes, white (LSL) and brown (LT). 2. From 18 weeks of age, LSL and LT were kept in 4 groups of 50 birds in a poultry house with passages to a roofed scratching room and a grassland area with a stocking density of one bird/10 m2. 3. All birds had transponders to record the movements of each hen between inside and outside areas and the time spent in each area during 24 h. Feather scoring was carried out at 6 ages from 20 to 48 weeks. At 44 weeks of age, TI reactions of 40 hens (20 from each genotype) were quantified and blood smears from 20 hens (10 from each genotype) were analysed for differential leucocyte counts. 4. LSL hens moved more frequently to outdoor areas than LT hens (44.66 vs 28.78 least square/d). However, the proportion of time spent on grassland was greater in LT than in LSL hens, whereas time (%) spent by LT hens in the roofed scratching area was less than for LSI hens. 5. In LT hens TI was shorter while heterophil/lymphocyte ratio and basophilia were greater than in LSL hens. 6. Total body feather score was poorer in LSL than in LT hens. Incidence of footpad inflammation was higher in LSL than LT hens. 7. There was a positive association between TI and footpad inflammation. The percentage of time spent on grassland and feather damage were inversely correlated. 8. More movement between the areas, as in LSL hens, was positively associated with fearfulness, whereas long periods on grassland, as in LT hens, were associated with indicators of increased stress. The negative correlation between feather damage and time spent outside suggests that feather pecking risk decreases in birds attracted to grassland.
Farm animal welfare is a major concern for society and food production. To more accurately evaluate animal farming in general and to avoid exposing farm animals to poor welfare situations, it is necessary to understand not only their behavioral but also their cognitive needs and capacities. Thus, general knowledge of how farm animals perceive and interact with their environment is of major importance for a range of stakeholders, from citizens to politicians to cognitive ethologists to philosophers. This review aims to outline the current state of farm animal cognition research and focuses on ungulate livestock species, such as cattle, horses, pigs and small ruminants, and reflects upon a defined set of cognitive capacities (physical cognition: categorization, numerical ability, object permanence, reasoning, tool use; social cognition: individual discrimination and recognition, communication with humans, social learning, attribution of attention, prosociality, fairness). We identify a lack of information on certain aspects of physico-cognitive capacities in most farm animal species, such as numerosity discrimination and object permanence. This leads to further questions on how livestock comprehend their physical environment and understand causal relationships. Increasing our knowledge in this area will facilitate efforts to adjust husbandry systems and enrichment items to meet the needs and preferences of farm animals. Research in the socio-cognitive domain indicates that ungulate livestock possess sophisticated mental capacities, such as the discrimination between, and recognition of, conspecifics as well as human handlers using multiple modalities. Livestock also react to very subtle behavioral cues of conspecifics and humans. These socio-cognitive capacities can impact human-animal interactions during management practices and introduce ethical considerations on how to treat livestock in general. We emphasize the importance of gaining a better understanding of how livestock species interact with their physical and social environments, as this information can improve housing and management conditions and can be used to evaluate the use and treatment of animals during production.
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