Related Research Articles
Animal welfare is the well-being of non-human animals. Formal standards of animal welfare vary between contexts,but are debated mostly by animal welfare groups,legislators,and academics. Animal welfare science uses measures such as longevity,disease,immunosuppression,behavior,physiology,and reproduction,although there is debate about which of these best indicate animal welfare.
Beak trimming,or beak conditioning,is the partial removal of the beak of poultry,especially layer hens and turkeys,although it is also be performed on some quail and ducks. When multiple birds are confined in small spaces due to farming practices,they are more likely to hurt each other through pecking. Beak trimming aims to avoid damage done by pecking,although the practice is criticized by animal welfare organizations and banned in several European countries. Beak trimming is most common in egg-laying strains of chickens. In some countries,such as the United States,turkeys routinely have their beaks trimmed. In the UK,only 10% of turkeys are beak trimmed.
Cribbing is a form of stereotypy,otherwise known as wind sucking or crib-biting. Cribbing is considered to be an abnormal,compulsive behavior seen in some horses,and is often labelled a stable vice. The major factors that cause cribbing include stress,stable management,genetic and gastrointestinal irritability.
Marian Stamp Dawkins is a British biologist and professor of ethology at the University of Oxford. Her research interests include vision in birds,animal signalling,behavioural synchrony,animal consciousness and animal welfare.
Battery cages are a housing system used by factory farms for various animal production methods,but primarily for egg-laying hens. The name arises from the arrangement of rows and columns of identical cages connected,in a unit,as in an artillery battery. Although the term is usually applied to poultry farming,similar cage systems are used for other animals. Battery cages have generated controversy between advocates for animal welfare and industrial producers.
Dust bathing is an animal behavior characterized by rolling or moving around in dust,dry earth or sand,with the likely purpose of removing parasites from fur,feathers or skin. Dust bathing is a maintenance behavior performed by a wide range of mammalian and avian species. For some animals,dust baths are necessary to maintain healthy feathers,skin,or fur,similar to bathing in water or wallowing in mud. In some mammals,dust bathing may be a way of transmitting chemical signals to the ground which marks an individual's territory.
Michael Calvert Appleby OBE is a British ethologist and animal welfare scientist,especially for farm animals. He obtained a BSc in Zoology at the University of Bristol and a PhD in Animal Behaviour at King's College,Cambridge. He then spent 20 years at the Poultry Research Centre in Scotland and the University of Edinburgh researching behaviour,husbandry,and welfare of farm animals. He worked for World Animal Protection from 2005 to 2016,and is now retired.
Feather pecking is a behavioural problem that occurs most frequently amongst domestic hens reared for egg production,although it does occur in other poultry such as pheasants,turkeys,ducks,broiler chickens and is sometimes seen in farmed ostriches. Feather pecking occurs when one bird repeatedly pecks at the feathers of another. The levels of severity may be recognized as mild and severe. Gentle feather pecking is considered to be a normal investigatory behaviour where the feathers of the recipient are hardly disturbed and therefore does not represent a problem. In severe feather pecking,however,the feathers of the recipient are grasped,pulled at and sometimes removed. This is painful for the receiving bird and can lead to trauma of the skin or bleeding,which in turn can lead to cannibalism and death.
Abnormal behavior of birds in captivity has been found to occur among both domesticated and wild birds. Abnormal behavior can be defined in several ways. Statistically,'abnormal' is when the occurrence,frequency or intensity of a behaviour varies statistically significantly,either more or less,from the normal value. This means that theoretically,almost any behaviour could become 'abnormal' in an individual. Less formally,'abnormal' includes any activity judged to be outside the normal behaviour pattern for captive birds of that particular class or age. For example,running rather than flying may be a normal behaviour and regularly observed in one species,however,in another species it might be normal but becomes 'abnormal' if it reaches a high frequency,or in another species it is rarely observed and any incidence is considered 'abnormal'. This article does not include 'one-off' behaviours performed by individual birds that might be considered abnormal for that individual,unless these are performed repeatedly by other individuals in the species and are recognised as part of the ethogram of that species.
Sham dustbathing is a behaviour performed by some birds when kept in cages with little or no access to litter,during which the birds perform all the elements of normal dustbathing,but in the complete absence of any substrate. This behaviour often has all the activities and temporal patterns of normal dustbathing,i.e. the bird initially scratches and bill-rakes at the ground,then erects its feathers and squats. Once lying down,the behaviour contains four main elements:vertical wing-shaking,head rubbing,bill-raking and scratching with one leg. Normal dustbathing is a maintenance behaviour whose performance results in dust collecting between the feathers. The dust is then subsequently shaken off which reduces the amount of feather lipids and so helps the plumage maintain good insulating capacity and may help control of ectoparasites.
Brenda McCowan is a research behaviorist interested in evolutionary,biological,and ecological aspects of animal behavior and communication. Her work focuses on improving the health and welfare of domesticated production animals,captive species,and wildlife using applied animal behavior and bioacoustics. She received her BS in Animal Physiology from Cornell University in 1985,and her PhD in Biological Anthropology from Harvard University in 1994. Dr. McCowan is the Program Head of Primate Behavioral Management at California National Primate Research Center,a position she has held since 2004. Dr. McCowan has been on the faculty at the University of California –Davis since 1999,and is currently an Associate Adjunct Professor in the Department of Population Health and Reproduction at the UC Davis School of Veterinary Medicine. She also heads the McCowan Lab of Behavioral Management at UC Davis School of Veterinary Medicine,and is affiliated with the SETI Institute,Hubbs-Sea World Institute,and Santa Fe Institute.
Vent pecking is an abnormal behaviour of birds performed primarily by commercial egg-laying hens. It is characterised by pecking damage to the cloaca,the surrounding skin and underlying tissue. Vent pecking frequently occurs immediately after an egg has been laid when the cloaca often remains partly everted exposing the mucosa,red from the physical trauma of oviposition or bleeding if the tissue is torn by her laying an egg. Vent pecking clearly causes pain and distress to the bird being pecked. Tearing of the skin increases susceptibility to disease and may lead to cannibalism,with possible evisceration of the pecked bird and ultimately,death.
Animal welfare science is the scientific study of the welfare of animals as pets,in zoos,laboratories,on farms and in the wild. Although animal welfare has been of great concern for many thousands of years in religion and culture,the investigation of animal welfare using rigorous scientific methods is a relatively recent development. The world's first Professor of Animal Welfare Science,Donald Broom,was appointed by Cambridge University (UK) in 1986.
Cannibalism in poultry is the act of one individual of a poultry species consuming all or part of another individual of the same species as food. It commonly occurs in flocks of domestic hens reared for egg production,although it can also occur in domestic turkeys,pheasants and other poultry species. Poultry create a social order of dominance known as pecking order. When pressure occurs within the flock,pecking can increase in aggression and escalate to cannibalism. Cannibalism can occur as a consequence of feather pecking which has caused denuded areas and bleeding on a bird's skin. Cannibalism can cause large mortality rates within the flock and large decreases in production due to the stress it causes. Vent pecking,sometimes called 'cloacal cannibalism',is considered to be a separate form of cannibalistic pecking as this occurs in well-feathered birds and only the cloaca is targeted. There are several causes that can lead to cannibalism such as:light and overheating,crowd size,nutrition,injury/death,genetics and learned behaviour. Research has been conducted to attempt to understand why poultry engage in this behaviour,as it is not totally understood. There are known methods of control to reduce cannibalism such as crowd size control,beak trimming,light manipulation,perches,selective genetics and eyewear.
Consumer demand tests for animals are studies designed to measure the relative strength of an animal's motivation to obtain resources such as different food items. Such demand tests quantify the strength of motivation animals have for resources whilst avoiding anthropomorphism and anthropocentrism.
The Universities Federation for Animal Welfare (UFAW) is an animal welfare science society. It is a UK-registered scientific and educational charity.
Felicity Anne Huntingford FRSE is an aquatic ecologist known for her work in fish behaviour.
Empathy in chickens is the ability of a chicken to understand and share the feelings of another chicken. The Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council's (BBSRC) Animal Welfare Initiative defines and recognizes that "...hens possess a fundamental capacity to empathise..." These empathetic responses in animals are well documented and are usually discussed along with issues related to cognition. The difference between animal cognition and animal emotion is recognized by ethicists. The specific emotional attribute of empathy in chickens has not been only investigated in terms of its existence but it has applications that have resulted in the designed reduction of stress in farm-raised poultry.
Christopher M. Sherwin was an English veterinary scientist and senior research fellow at the University of Bristol Veterinary School in Lower Langford,Somerset. He specialised in applied ethology,the study of the behaviour of animals in the context of their interactions with humans,and of how to balance the animals' needs with the demands placed on them by humans.
Jane Louise Hurst is the William Prescott Professor of Animal Science at the University of Liverpool. She is Head of Mammalian Behaviour &Evolution. She studies scent communication between mammals,as well as animal welfare and pest control. She served as the president of the Association for the Study of Animal Behaviour from 2010 to 2012.
References
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- 1 2 "Field Chief Editors".
- ↑ "Christine Nicol".
- ↑ "New radio series explores animal welfare and animal rights".
- 1 2 "UFAW Medal for Outstanding Contributions to Animal Welfare Science".
- ↑ "Leroy Fellowship Award".
- 1 2 "BVA Wooldridge Memorial Award".
- 1 2 "Tinbergen Lecturer".
- ↑ "Professor Christine Nico".
- ↑ "Would You Eat an Alien?".
- ↑ Nicol, Christine J. (1987). "Behavioural responses of laying hens following a period of spatial restriction". Animal Behaviour. 35 (6): 1709–1719. doi:10.1016/S0003-3472(87)80063-5. S2CID 53147960.
- ↑ Nicol, Christine J.; Caplen, Gina; Edgar, Joanne; Browne, William J. (2009). "Associations between welfare indicators and environmental choice in laying hens". Animal Behaviour. 78 (2): 413–424. doi:10.1016/j.anbehav.2009.05.016. S2CID 54341705.
- ↑ "Study of crib-biting and gastric inflammation and ulceration in young horses" (PDF).
- ↑ Cuff, Andrew R.; Wiseman, Ashleigh L. A.; Bishop, Peter J.; Michel, Krijn B.; Gaignet, Raphäelle; Hutchinson, John R. (7 October 2022). "From Unpleasant to Unbearable - Why And How to Implement an Upper Limit to Pain And Other Forms of Suffering in Research with Animals". Journal of Anatomy. 3 (4): 289–311. doi:10.1111/joa.13767. PMC 9877486 . PMID 36206401. S2CID 252758737.
- ↑ Edgar, J.L.; Paul, E.S.; Nicol, C.J. (2013). "Protective mother hens: Cognitive influences on the avian maternal response". Animal Behaviour. 86 (2): 223–229. doi:10.1016/j.anbehav.2013.05.004. S2CID 53179718.
- ↑ Nicol, Christine; Bejder, Lars; Green, Laura; Johnson, Craig; Keeling, Linda; Noren, Dawn; Van Der Hoop, Julie; Simmonds, Mark (2020). "Anthropogenic Threats to Wild Cetacean Welfare and a Tool to Inform Policy in This Area". Frontiers in Veterinary Science. 7: 57. doi: 10.3389/fvets.2020.00057 . PMC 7058697 . PMID 32185183.
- ↑ "The Behavioural Biology of Chickens" (PDF).
