Lecture 7

Question 1

What are the 5 freedoms?

Answer 1

1. Freedom from Hunger and Thirst - by ready access to fresh water and a diet to maintain full health and vigour
2. Freedom from Discomfort - by providing an appropriate environment
   including shelter and a comfortable resting area
3. Freedom from Pain, Injury or Disease - by prevention or rapid diagnosis and
   treatment
4. Freedom to Express Normal Behaviour - by providing sufficient space, proper facilities and company of the animal’s own kind
5. Freedom from Fear and Distress - by ensuring conditions and treatment
   which avoid mental suffering

Question 2

What is freedom from hunger?

Answer 2

“hunger and thirst are the two most basic, primitive and unremitting of all motivating forces” (Webster, 1995)

Failure to eat/drink leads to death

Lack of essential nutrients leads to illness, and death

Question 3

What does mild deprivation do?

Answer 3

mild deprivation has little effect in fact, feed restriction in rodents is well known to
increase life-span

Question 4

What does ad lib feeding do?

Answer 4

ad lib feeding of some species can lead to
disease and poor reproductive performance

eg. Sows, broiler chickens, rodents
Increasing awareness of obesity as a problem- in humans, dogs, cats, parrots

Question 5

Is hunger (or thirst) always indicative of poor welfare?

Answer 5

depends on the severity of the hunger, if the animal’s body condition is decreasing then it is an indication of poor welfare. an animal should always have access to water and should not be thirsty

Is not some degree of hunger necessary to regulate feed intake?

At what point should we consider hunger a welfare problem?

Question 6

What is hunger?

Answer 6

the state in which an animal is stimulated to eat

Question 7

What is malnourished?

Answer 7

insufficient quality lack of nutrients, or incorrectly balanced

vitamin A deficiency

Question 8

What is Under nourished?

Answer 8

insufficient quantity

poor body condition

Question 9

What is satiety?

Answer 9

feedback systems that inhibit feeding

Question 10

What is the model of feeding behaviour?

Answer 10

Hunger is the motivation behind feeding behaviour

Appetitive phase: increasing hunger,
foraging behaviour (increased activity and increased aggression)

Consummatory phase: feeding (negative feedback loop)

Question 11

What does hunger result in?

Answer 11

Hunger results in increased feeding motivation, expressed as:

-Increased activity (hunting/foraging)
-Increased aggression- feed competitor resource guarding
-Redirected oral behaviours:
–Increased drinking (polydipsia)
–Stereotypies, Coprophagia (eating poop), Geophagia (eating dirt)

Question 12

Has selection of species for high growth increased hunger when limit fed?

Answer 12

Has selection of species for high growth increased hunger when limit fed?

May depend on species and gut storage….

-Pigs: limited gut storage, bouts of absorption
-Ruminants: large storage, continuous absorption
-Chickens: moderate storage, continuous absorption

Reflected in maximum transport times…

Question 13

Recommended maximum transport times in Canada?

Answer 13

Monogastrics (pigs, equine) - 28 h
Ruminants (cattle, sheep, goats) - 36 h
Poultry - 28 h
Chicks (newly hatched) - 72 h (yolk sac)
Calves - 12 h

Question 14

• Max transport times in other countries are generally much shorter. WHY?

Answer 14

Have more slaughter plants thus don’t have to travel as far

Question 15

What Situations cause acute* hunger/thirst?

Answer 15

Feed system breakdown/outage
Transport- feed restriction
–long transports- assembly yards
Marketing- auction or assembly yards
Skip a day feeding- sows, broiler breeders
Forced moulting – laying hens

*Acute: Resulting from an accident (quickly rectified), or deliberate management decision

Question 16

What Situations result in chronic hunger?

Answer 16

Situations resulting in chronic hunger are more common and problematic:

Long term restriction of feed intake
Poor pasture or range conditions
—Starvation during drought
—Overstocking/overgrazing
Limit feeding of breeding animals
–Sows, broiler breeders
Subordinate animals, when feed is limited

Call SPCA if you see this

Question 17

Problems related to hunger affect?

Answer 17

1) Behaviour (compensation/coping strategies)
2) Physiology (body condition, coat condition, healing)
3) Illness (morbidity, mortality)

Observational measures: feed intake, rate of eating, time spent feeding.

Operant measures: willingness to work for
food (lever presses, weighted push gate)

Question 18

How hard will pigs work to obtain food?

Answer 18

Operant conditioning:
—Fixed ratio (10 presses per reward)
—Progressive ratio (increasing number
of presses needed for each reward)
Pigs fed once per day at 1.0, 0.8, 0.6 and 0.4 of ad libitum
Tested at 1, 5 and 22 hr after feeding

Conclusions: On levels similar to that fed
breeding animals (60% of ad lib), pigs reached maximum response rate within 5 hours of feeding

Breeding pigs are hungry approx 19 hours/day

Question 19

What are Stereotypies?

Answer 19

Animals in confinement exhibit two general types of stereotypies

Oral stereotypies
–associated with hunger or feed quality
Movement stereotypies
–associated with restrictive housing

Question 20

Can increasing feed volume with fibre
reduce stereotypies?

Answer 20

Dry sows were fed diets varying in volume
and fibre content:
–Restricted fed (2kg conventional diet)
–Restricted plus fibre (2.3kg)
–Ad lib fibre

Measured time spent eating and
performing oral behaviours

Fibre increased feeding time and reduced
oral behaviours/stereotypies in sows

Providing high fibre diets has also been
shown to reduce:
–Cribbing and wood chewing in horses
–Feather pecking in poultry
–Tail biting in pigs
–Tongue rolling in cattle

Question 21

Chronic Hunger: Starvation

Answer 21

Some extensive production systems experience seasonal weight loss, either annually or during dry years
—Extensive grazing systems
How much weight loss can be tolerated?
At what point is massive culling called for?
Examples:
–Australian outback
–Blizzards
–Hay shortages

Question 22

What is Thirst or water restriction?

Answer 22

Defined as insufficient water to meet physiological requirements

Problems of water quality and quantity
–Eg High sulfur levels in sloughs

Basic management- but a common problem in both intensive and extensive systems

Question 23

How do we assess comfort?

Answer 23

Preference tests:
– What do they want?
– How much do they want it?
– Do they really need it?

‘Ask’ the animal…
-Preference tests – animals can ‘vote with
their feet’
-Operant conditioning- learn a task, ‘what
will they work for?’
-Observe their behaviour…

Question 24

What happened on the hen flooring test?

Answer 24

Hens were offered 2 options at once; time spent on each was recorded

Order of preference:
– hexagonal wire netting (first)
– heavy-gauge wire mesh
– conventional wire mesh
– perforated sheet metal (last)

The one they chose was really bad on their feet and legs and caused problems

Question 25

Flooring for pigs – do they prefer straw
or concrete?

Answer 25

sometimes straw bedding was preferred
sometimes concrete

this was dependent on the temperature

Question 26

Real Preferences?

Answer 26

Early preference tests were too simple
Preferences vary with conditions Therefore:

-Consider multiple factors/ perform multiple studies (eg. seasonal differences)
-Consider the previous experience of subjects (prefer what is familiar)

Question 27

How do we determine the strength of a preference?

Answer 27

Test ‘willingness to pay’

Using Operant test (trained on button/lever), or Physical effort (push gate)