Key Area 4: Animal Welfare Unit 3: Sustainability and Interdependence.

Key Area 4: Animal Welfare

Unit 3: Sustainability and Interdependence

Domesticated Animals• Domesticated animals should be able

to live free from disease and to grow vigorously.

• They should be able to behave in natural ways.

• These factors are now considered to be an important part of an animal’s welfare.

CfE Higher BiologySustainability

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Domesticated Animals


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• Previously an animals welfare and wellbeing depended solely on its physical wellbeing,

• And ability to :– Grow– Reproduce and raise offspring– Resist disease.

Domesticate Animals


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• The Farm Animal Welfare Council (FAWC) has worked to broaden this view of animal welfare.

• It has developed the Five Freedoms for Animal Welfare.

• What are these 5 freedoms?



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• Freedom from hunger and thirst• Freedom from discomfort• Freedom from pain, injury and

disease• Freedom to express normal

behaviour• Freedom from fear and distress



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• What might be normal, natural behaviour patterns?

• Adequate space for hens to stretch wings, wag tails, nest building in pigs when about to farrow.



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• Methods of livestock production that ensure the well being of animals raises issues of costs for the farmer.

• These increased costs however can result in long term benefits.

• What might these benefits be?



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• Contented, unstressed animals grow better, breed more successfully and generate higher quality products (meat, cheese, milk).

• Animals that are stressed do the opposite.

Poor welfare


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• Animals kept in unnatural or inferior and low grade conditions display behaviour patterns that are very different to those they would show in their natural environment.

• These behaviours are indicators of poor welfare and result in:– Ill health, stress, lack of productivity.

Behavioural Indicators


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Stereotypy

Misdirected Behaviour

Failure in Sexual BehaviourFailure in Parenting Behaviour

Altered levels of Activity

Repetitive behaviour, may be natural but out of context.e.g. cats pacing in zoos, rocking in animals, chewing without food being present. A natural behaviour that is directed against e.g. another animal. Examples include misdirected predation i.e. attacking others or misdirected sexual behaviour. e.g. cannibalism in chickens.

Natural pattern of sexual behaviour either in terms of partners or timing or action does not happen.

Especially in mammals, where normal parenting behaviours and lack of parental care occur. This can lead to offspring not thriving or dying. Or the offspring exhibiting abnormal behaviours.

From lack of activity where expected to increased activity i.e. over grooming or high level of aggression.

Observing behaviour (ethology)


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• The study of animal behaviour is called ethology.

• ‘Ethos’ – character, ‘ology’ – the study of• Ethologists study the biological roots and

meanings of animal actions.• Why study Animal Behaviour?– Informs us about the evolution of how we

think, act and interact.– Understand why animals behave the way

they do– Understand when an animal has a need and

use this to make changes for the animals’ welfare



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• Normal behaviour patterns of animals that have been domesticated can be recognised by watching them in natural surroundings.

• Why are these scientific observations carried out in natural or semi natural environments?–Natural environment shows what the

default behaviour is i.e. the one that causes the least distress/alteration to the animal.



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• An ethogram can then be produced.• This is a comprehensive list, inventory or

description of all the behaviours of an organism.

• A quantitative description of an animal’s normal behaviour.

• They are constructed by spending time watching animals, taking careful notes and making sense of the observed behaviour.



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• From the behaviour observed a hypothesis can be produced.

• An investigation can then be carried out to test this hypothesis.

• Conclusions can then be drawn from the investigation results about the welfare needs of the animal.

Anthropomorphism


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• Anthropomorphism is the personification or the attribution of human characteristics of to non-humans i.e. animals.

• When analysing animal behaviour it is crucial that this behaviour is not given a human interpretation.

• The conclusions of such studies must be based on scientific data not what we as humans would like or consider suitable.

Preference testing


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• The closest we have got to asking animals what they like is preference testing.

• This gives animals a choice of two conditions and lets the animals choose between the various alternatives.

• We can see how strongly an animal prefers an particular alternative using these tests.

• Research like this allows animals to be kept in the conditions they prefer which enhances their well being.

Preference testing


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• An early experiment in preference testing looked at types of flooring for hens.

• They were housed in double cages with different flooring and allowed to move freely between the two areas.

• The experimenters noted the length of time a bird spent on each side of the cage to attribute preference.

• But it is more complicated than this.

Preference testing


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• Animals don’t always make the same choices.

• The conditions an animal chooses for one activity may not be what it chooses when it decides to do something else.

Wrongly guessing what animals want


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Case 1• Scientists discovered several years ago

that chickens see the world very differently to us.

• Chickens were traditionally packed by humans into crates for transport.

• Someone eventually invented a mechanical chicken catcher to do the job.

• It appeared that this would certainly be easier for the poultry industry but might not be so good for the chickens.



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• However research into the stress levels in chickens showed that being caught and packed by the machine was a lot less stressful.

• Reference: Duncan, I. J.H., Gillian, S. S., Kettlewell, P., Berry, P., and Carlisle, A. J. , "Comparison of the stressfulness of harvesting broiler chickens by machine and by hand," British Poultry Science 27 (1986)



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Case 2• A government committee once

recommended that hens in battery cages should not be housed on fine gauge hexagonal wire floors.

• However, when hens were given a choice of flooring they preferred the type that had been criticised.

• Reference: Hughes, B.O. and A.J. Black. 1973. The preference of domestic hens for different types of battery cage floor. Br. Poult. Sci. 14: 615-619

Motivation


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• What is motivation ?• Motivation is the desire to do things.

It is what causes us to act.• The difference between waking up

and going out running, walking etc. and lazing about the house all day.

• It is about setting and attaining goals.

Motivation


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• Establishing the strength of an animal‘s motivation to perform a behaviour is one of the most important steps in identifying a potential source of suffering.

• It can be an important way to improve their lives.

Motivation


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• Motivation drives animals to act in the way that they do.

• Motivation can be caused by hunger.• A hungry animal will be motivated to

find food as it will have a high feeding drive.

• An animal that is not hungry and has its needs met however is not motivated to find food.

Motivation


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• Preference testing can be used to compare motivation for two desirable factors.

Key Area 4: Animal Welfare Unit 3: Sustainability and Interdependence.

Documents

interdependence animals

animals welfare

unstressed animals

interdependence freedom

natural behaviour patterns

view of animal welfare

misdirected sexual behaviour

natural ways