13. Beef Cattle Behaviour Flashcards
Beef cattle vision:
- Panoramic vision
- Binocular vision
- Focus
- Pupil shape
- Distinguishing wavelengths
- Depth perception
Panoramic vision = 330
- Blind spot directly behind them
Binocular vision = 25-50
- Allows for greater predator awareness
- Don’t have good depth perception
Focus
- Tend to have weak eye muscles which inhibits their ability to focus quickly on objects
- What they see lacks definition so they will often balk and refuse to cross a shadow or drain grate
Pupils
- Slit-shaped
Wavelengths
- Can distinguish long wavelengths better than shorter wavelengths
- Long: yellow, orange and reds
- Short: blue, grey and greens
- Can distinguish all colours from a grey background except blue
Depth perception
- Poor
Smell
- While grazing, cattle constantly sniff the pasture
- Can distinguish smell
- Secondary olfaction system can detect pheromones (volatile chemicals) important for both reproduction and feed selection
Taste
- Cattle have ~30,000 taste buds that can differentiate acid (sour), bitter, salt, and sweet solutions
What are cattle very sensitive to?
Noise; ears are very sensitive
- Can be calmed with soothing music or stressed by loud noises
- Dairy breeds are more sensitive to sound and touch than beef breeds
How can touch be used to calm cattle?
Cutaneous sensitivity (skin sensitivity) can be used to calm cattle by scratching under the neck and behind the ears
- areas they find difficult to access and scratch
How do cattle flight zones differ?
- Cattle flight zones vary greatly depending on how cattle have been raised and handled
- Feedlot cattle may move away from ppl entering their flight zone (approx 1.5m)
- Less handled range cattle may have a flight zone of 30m
When are dominance hierarchies in young beef steers formed?
Soon after weaning
- remain stable even when the same groups are moved to other pens (new environment)
How is dominance related to eating behaviour in beef cattle?
Dominance and eating behaviour have been observed in beef cattle where only one animal at a time could eat
- found that high-ranking cattle had fewer meals but tended to spend more time per day eating
How does the dominance hierarchy in cattle “function” to avoid a fight?
- In an exchange btw 2 animals where one is larger, healthier, stronger and older it may take no more than a movement gesture or threat to make the smaller animal submit or yield space
- An aggressive bull will turn his body perpendicular to a challenger to display full height and length
- Aggression is expressed by bunting or striking a challenger with the head
What breed of cattle are generally more excitable?
Bos indicus cattle are generally more excitable than the European Bos taurus breeds
Leadership
Patterns of leadership during grazing movements
- High-ranking animals (not always the most dominant) TEND to lead; does not have control over herd direction, if a change of flight direction is caused it will run forward back to the front
- Medium ranks tend to follow
- Low-ranking animals tend to be independent
- Cattle will follow the lead animal quietly
How many individuals can a cow identify?
They can individually identify 50-70 other herd members
Grazing
- 9hrs/day
- Graze pasture that is 5 cm above the ground, distinguishing plants while grazing
- Affected by temp; in very high temps they will graze predominantly at night
- Move slowly across the pasture with muzzle close to the ground, biting and tearing off grass, which is swallowed without much chewing
- Ruminate when resting and time devoted to ruminating is approximately 3/4 of that spent in grazing
Group cohesion during grazing
- In open treeless areas, free-ranging cattle group into large mods
- The distance btw individuals are smaller than in areas with sparse to moderate tree and shrub cover
- Mob is more tightly clumped in open areas which affects the grazing pattern
What does the amount of time that cattle spend resting depend on?
- Environmental conditions
- Time spent ruminating and grazing
- Breed