Effects of social aspects and management strategies on animal welfare

The Work Package 3.6 of Welfare Quality® aims to address social aspects and management strategies that may play a role in defining the welfare levels of pigs and cattle.

In its first subtask, the project will identify lines of pigs with both high and low aggression genotypes, evaluate the social behaviour of these lines in industry-relevant situations, and evaluate the behavioural phenotype of these lines in non-social situations to determine whether any undesirable behavioural changes are present.
Thus far, we have started to collect on-farm data from a large commercial pedigree herd. The following data are being collected from 1500 pigs: aggressive behaviour at mixing (24-hour videos), an indicator trait related to aggressive behaviour (number of skin lesions), behaviour during handling and social and non-social behaviours in a stable group.

The second subtask is concerned with how the amount and type of dietary fibre affects social stress and production in pregnant sows that are kept in two different housing systems: an electronic feeding system and a Biofix or “trickle feed” system. Sows did not show accommodation problems with the “trickle feed” system. Sows accommodated very quickly to the electronic feeding system in the second gestation period (less than 24 hours) compared to the first gestation period (about five days). In both gestating periods, old sows were more active than young sows.

The third subtask evaluates the effects of social hierarchies and competition for feed on welfare of dairy and beef cattle. For the beef study, 72 female calves in 9 lots of 8 animals per pen received 3 treatments, consisting of feed bunk lengths for 4, 3 or 2 animals with 3 replicates per treatment. The study has been completed, but results are not yet available. In the dairy study, a total of 142 lactating Holstein cows were monitored over a period of 10 months to observe the effects of grouping primiparous cows (PPCs, comprising a total of 90 cows) separately from multiparous cows (MPCs, 52 cows) on performance, feeding behaviour, feed intake, and milk production of PPCs. Total DMI and milk production of PPCs were similar in both the PM and PP groups. Primiparous cows in the PP group showed a numerically greater number of visits to the robotic milking unit and to the feed troughs, but apparently spent less time eating (measured as hours/day) than PPCs in the PM group. Separating primiparous from multiparous cows resulted in increased drinking and ruminating activities with no changes in self grooming or aversive behaviours. It is concluded that either grouping strategy had no effect on stress of PPCs as production and intake were not affected, or if stress was present, the studied blood parameters were not useful indicators of it.

The last subtask addresses the role of playing behaviour. Play behaviour in young animals is known to have double-positive effects on their welfare. First, it enhances well-being immediately because it is accompanied by positive emotions. Second, it strengthens the abilities of the animals to cope with challenging and adverse situations. These coping–ability–enhancing effects can last well beyond the period when the play was exhibited, sometimes possibly for life. In the experiment conducted within Welfare Quality® and reported in the paper (Chalouková et al., in press), we asked whether three different housing systems for lactating sows and their pre-weaning piglets allow/incite different levels of piglet play and, if so, whether these different levels of play reduced later tendencies of the pigs to act aggressively against each other. Although environmental enrichment did not seem to mitigate aggression during post-weaning mixing, it substantially reduced the tendency of pigs to behave aggressively during feed competition later in life. Therefore, providing pigs with straw bedding and more space before weaning seems a feasible method to improve welfare, both during infancy and later in life.

Alex Bach
Leader of the Work Package 3.6 : Social stress

More information: alex.bach@irta.es