Implementation of a Pig Toilet in a Nursery Pen with a Straw-Littered Lying Area

Abstract

In this study, a pig toilet was installed on an organic pig farm, which enabled pigs to use a lying area littered with straw and keep it clean. The pig toilet was separated into a defaecation area and a urination area and nursery pigs were trained to use the urination area by means of a rewarding system. A total of 24 piglets were weaned at 6–7 weeks of age and housed in the experimental system for four-week periods. Per trial, a group of four pigs was formed, and videos were recorded on two days per week (08:00 to 18:00). Direct observation was carried out in the first and last week of each trial. In total, 1500 eliminations were video-analysed. An individual pig had an average of 7.1 ± 1.4 defaecations and 4.8 ± 0.8 urinations per day. In total, 96.4% of all urinations and 97.4% of all defaecations were performed in the pig toilet. However, most urinations took place in the defaecation area as well (90.4%). Even if the training to spatially separate defecation and urination behaviour was not successful, we showed that a pig toilet offers the possibility to create littered lying areas, possibly increasing animal welfare.

Describing Behavior Sequences of Fattening Pigs Using Process Mining on Video Data and Automated Pig Behavior Recognition

“…In this study, only defecation behavior was classified as elimination behavior, confirming a peak in defecation during the early afternoon hours. The frequency of defecation events aligns with plausible results from other studies with four to seveen defecation events per pig per day [10,44]. Spatially, the identified defecation events were concentrated in a corner of the pen.…”