The incidence of injuries to pregnant sows kept in dynamic groups in a commercial herd was recorded over a period of 18 months. The sows were maintained in a solid-floored building with a straw-bedded lying area allowing 1.7 m2 per sow and fed by means of electronic feeders. Injuries on 12 possible areas of the body were assessed every week, and graded on the scale of 0 to 3 (maximum body score 36). The lesion scores sustained by the sows were very low, with a maximum of 19 and a median of 4. Lesions of the greatest severity constituted only 0.16 per cent of all the recorded injuries. The injuries were not distributed uniformly over the body, most being on the shoulders, flanks and hindquarters, with very few on the head or in the vulval region. The total injury score was related to parity, with sows in parities one, two and three sustaining more injuries than sows in later parities, and it was also related negatively to bodyweight. More agonistic interactions were observed between sows in the lying area and in the vicinity of the feeders than in the dunging area.

No abstract

L’importance du bien-être des animaux qui vivent sous la dépendance des humains (animaux d’élevage, de compagnie, de zoo, de cirque, d’expérimentation…) s’est affirmée progressivement au cours des 50 dernières années. Dans cette note, le concept de bien-être animal a été replacé dans ses contextes, philosophique, sociétal et juridique, qui influencent sa prise en compte et la signification qui lui est conférée. Une attention particulière a été portée aux bases scientifiques de la notion de bien-être, qui repose sur les caractéristiques psychiques des animaux, êtres sensibles et conscients. Notre définition du concept de bien-être est centrée sur l’état mental de l’individu dans son environnement et se démarque clairement du concept de bientraitance qui fait référence aux actions humaines positives envers les animaux, condition nécessaire au bien-être mais dont le résultat doit s’évaluer au niveau de l’animal. En outre, cette dimension mentale porte l’attention sur le fait qu’une bonne santé, un niveau de production satisfaisant ou une absence de stress ne suffisent pas. Il faut aussi prendre en compte ce que l’animal ressent, les perceptions subjectives déplaisantes, telles que la frustration, la douleur et la souffrance, mais aussi rechercher les signes d’expression d’émotions positives. Les protocoles d’évaluation du bien-être des animaux doivent ainsi combiner l’analyse des comportements et de l’état physiologique et sanitaire de l’animal avec les données sur l’environnement.

Nose ringing of outdoor sows is widely practiced to reduce pasture damage, but may have both short and longer term implications for animal welfare. This study was carried out to assess the effectiveness of different forms of nose ring and the extent of behavioural modification which they caused.Six groups of 5 sows were allocated between three treatments: unrung (U), rung with three traditional boss-rings through the upper rim of the nasal disc (TR) or rung with a single bull-ring through the nasal septum (BR). Groups were placed in adjacent paddocks on undamaged grass leys at a stocking rate of 38 sows/ha. Pasture damage was assessed weekly by measuring proportions of grass, bare earth and overturned earth in 20 half-metre square quadrats per paddock on a fixed sampling pattern.