4/5. Dairy cattle behaviour and welfare

Question 1

behaviour changes in domestic dairy cattle vs natural bovidae (5)

Answer 1

1. Vigilance: reduced by 6,000 to 9,000 yrs of artificial
   selection for docility (esp. fear of humans)
2. Maternal: cow-calf separation, and selection for milk let- down, do not favour strong maternal care traits
3. Reproductive behaviour: seasonal breeding receptivity replaced by ability to breed year-round, also AI
4. Feeding: Totally Mixed Ration (TMR) diet, often zero- grazing by the animal; delivery impacts timing of feeding esp important lactating cows
5. Social behaviour: impacted by hand-rearing calves (e.g., male dairy bulls more aggressive toward human handlers)

Question 2

what is nose pressing in dairy cattle?

Answer 2

a behavior shown in dairy cows which push the nose firmly and directly onto barn objects. Little is known about the reasons why this behavior takes place

Question 3

what is tongue rolling in dairy cattle and what is preventoin and treatment?

Answer 3

a sign of psychological or behavioral frustration

Prevention and treatment:
* High forage diet
* Grazing

Question 4

Behaviour problems: dairy cattle (5)

Answer 4

1. Nose-pressing
2. Tongue-rolling
3. Problem behaviour during handling
4. Non-nutritive sucking by calves
5. Problems related to lying

Question 5

problem behaviours in dairy cattle during handling

Answer 5

balking
kicking

Question 6

common reasons for balking in dairy cattle

Answer 6

(stopping - refusing to move forward)
* Shadows and stark flooring transitions in flooring
* Entering the milking parlour
* Passing through a foot bath
* Loading onto a truck / trailer

Question 7

how to prevent and treat problem behaviours during handling?

Answer 7

• Use and habituate cows to good handling
• Follow natural behaviour principles:
  > Flight zone (smaller for dairy vs beef cattle
  > Point of balance
  > Following behaviour
• Habituate cows to the facilities
• Provide good facilities:
  > Well-lit
  > Limited presentation of novel stimuli

Question 8

Non-nutritive sucking by calves: what is it and why is it significant

Answer 8

-Sucking (creation of at least a partial vacuum) on pen fixtures or body parts of other calves - objects that provide no apparent nutritive reinforcement
-Body parts targeted are the muzzle, ears, navel, inguinal area (e.g., teats or scrotum)

Significance:
* Important means of disease transmission (?)
* Hairballs may form in the digestive tract
* Urine may be ingested esp when males are subjects
* Considered “abnormal” - not seen by calves raised on cows
* Possible link to “milk stealing” during lactation (?)

Question 9

Non-nutritive sucking by dairy calves, Prevention & treatments:

Answer 9

Feed calves to appetite - hunger plays some role

Satisfying the motivation to suck after milk feeding
* Natural feeding methods – sucking is important (e.g., teat
buckets, automated milk-feeding systems, use of nurse cows)
* Mimic the natural feeding duration (~10 min)
* Provide “blind” / “dummy” teats with non-perforated tips for calves to suck on after the meal to avoid cross-sucking
* Provide a “distraction” (e.g., feed hay after milk meal)

Question 10

Problems related to lying

Answer 10

1. Lying in alleyways or transfer alleys
2. Lying backwards (turned-around) in the stall
3. Not standing-up or lying-down in a natural way, resulting, over time, in injury
4. Extreme lying durations (both short, and long)

Question 11

significance of problems related to lying

Answer 11

Significance:
* A fundamental behavioural need for lying (12 to 13 h/d for lactating cows, housed indoors)
* Welfare implications (e.g., fatigue, perhaps also pain – from standing on concrete flooring)
* Extreme durations associated with health problems (e.g., long duration, severe lameness) and associated with reduced milk production
* Duration of lying can be impacted by the inability
to change position easily (without hitting a wall, or stall divider)

Question 12

Problems with lying behaviour
Prevention & treatments:

Answer 12

• Stall dimensions appropriate to cow size (circa 2020)
• Expose calves to freestalls from a young age so they become accustomed to using them
• Stocking density ≤ 120%, which is a Requirement of the Code of Practice (i.e., 120 cows for 100 stalls)
• Innovation / testing stall designs

Question 13

Prioritizing welfare issues can be done based on:

Answer 13

• Prevalence – how common is the problem and / or what proportion of dairy animals does the problem effect
• Severity – how impactful the issue would be on the animal in terms of eliciting negative affects
• Duration – period of time over which the animal would be affected

Question 14

Welfare problems: dairy cattle

Answer 14

• Early maternal separation
• Pain caused by routine practices
• Poor stall design
• Poor foot health / body condition (“injuries”)
• Delayed culling and / or euthanasia of sick / injured animals

Question 15

rationale for early maternal separation in dairy cattle, and issues related to it

Answer 15

• Dairy production is about milk… (calves are in direct “competition” for the saleable product)
• Leaving calves to nurse can interfere with milk let- down – cows holding back their milk
• Separation can reduce the risk of transmitting certain diseases (e.g., Johnes disease)

So what:
* There is evidence that, for healthy calves, weight gain can actually be improved when calves are kept with the dam and fed the same amount vs rearing in isolation (the convention)
* A particularly sensitive issue with consumers (prevents natural behaviour)

Question 16

should we separate cows and calves later?

Answer 16

Behavioural responses to separation increase with age for calves. Results for cows were in the same direction.

Question 17

routine practices in dairy cattle that cause pain

Answer 17

dehorning and tail docking

Question 18

rationale for dehorning

Answer 18

• Prevent injuries to handlers and each other
• Reduce input costs as animals with horns require more space

Question 19

rationale for tail docking

Answer 19

• Improve milker comfort
• Perceived improvement cow cleanliness

Question 20

Addressing the issue of tail-docking:
can it be performed without pain? are there benefits? any legal requirements?

Answer 20

• Tail-docking of cattle can actually be performed without obvious signs of pain (Tom et al, 2002)…
• However, studies showed tail-docked cows were NOT cleaner, nor did the have a lower incidence of mastitis (i.e., tail-docking was not having the perceived benefit)
• Thus, a Requirement of the Code of Practice is: “Dairy cattle must not be tail-docked unless medically necessary”.

Question 21

Addressing the issue of disbudding / dehorning:
alternatives and legal reuirements

Answer 21

• Use of polled genetics; might gene editing be acceptable to the public / consumers?
• Code of Practice (2009) states “Pain control must be used when dehorning or disbudding.”
• A survey of 238 vets, 603 dairy farms in Ontario
• Vets: 97% using local anesthetic, 48% also use an NSAID
• Farmers: 62% use anesthetic, 24% use an NSAID

Question 22

Delayed culling and / or euthanasia; issue and rationale

Answer 22

Issue:
Cases of downed dairy cows on farms and at auction
markets suggest room for improvement (most often these are dairy cows, not beef cows)

Rationale:
* Hoping for recovery of the animal
* The ethic / duty of care (euthanasia seen as failure?)
* Loss of income and cost - for animals killed on farm
* Culture of not wanting to be wasteful
* Uncertain understanding of how poor health influences capacity to withstand stress of transport and handling which occurs at culling
* Poor understanding (by all) of what happens to cull cows
after leaving the home farm

Question 23

“So what?” about cull cow management:

Answer 23

i. Problem cull cows are often sick and not expected to
recover and so may be suffering before being shipped
ii. (I repeat) animals suffering for profit does not sit well with the public ideal of animal care stewardship

Question 24

addressing the issue of delayed culling and/or euthanasia:

Answer 24

i. Dairy Code of Practice (2009) provides an excellent decision tree to assist caretakers – including vets, in making timely culling decisions
ii. This includes info RE acute culls such as those suffering from a traumatic injury

• Vets need to get involved!
• Get clients to systematically assess cull cow condition before making the decision to ship – using critical control points to determine fitness for transport
• proAction Animal Care Program requires an SOP for shipping cattle

Question 25

Lameness, and body injuries in dairy cattle; why they continue to be a problem

Answer 25

Lameness: Dairy cows have a number of different problems with their feet and legs, manifest as abnormal gait and limping

Injuries: Aberrations on their tarsal and carpal joints, and on the dorsal aspect of the neck, often referred to as “injuries”

Farmers underestimate the prevalence of these issues, and so they may not think they have a problem

Vets have focused more on sickness and disease and these issues do not really fall into those categories

Farmers and vets have focused on things that impact
productivity and profitability (e.g., mastitis, reproductive health, ketosis)

Causes of these problems are multi-factorial, and complex (i.e., no quick fix). Not all animals at a facility are affected

Question 26

issues related to lameness and body injuries of cows

Answer 26

• Most conditions causing lameness are painful (thus they limp)
• Painfulness of injuries is less obvious, but these certainly reflect deficits in housing / enviro
• Both conditions compromise longevity / ROI
• When conventional housing results in a significant proportion of the cow herd becoming lame or injured can we say we are good animal caretakers?

Question 27

how common is lameness and body injuries in dairy cattle?

Answer 27

• Prevalence of lameness is significant
• Clinical lameness in freestall herds in the northeast USA = 54.8%; BC = 27.9%, (vonKyserlingk et al, 2012)
• Herd-level lameness prevalence from Canada’s National Dairy Study (Kelton et al, 2016):
  Tiestall: 32.1%
  Freestall: 27.5%
  Pack barn: 12.5%
• Prevalence of injuries is also significant

Question 28

Lameness, and body injuries
Addressing these issues:

Answer 28

• More attention on welfare has helped prioritize addressing these issues
• Causal factors and treatments for lameness covered elsewhere (e.g., Dairy Health Management)
• Focus here is on systematic measurement / scoring, for early intervention and on-going monitoring of both conditions. How can we do that?
• Both conditions have, in the last 2 years, been assessed on every dairy farm in Canada as part of the industry’s proAction Animal Care Assessment initiative

Question 29

Three comnponents of proAction’s animal care assessment

Answer 29

1. Producer self-evaluation questionnaire: 20 questions to determine whether they are meeting (certain) Requirements from the Code of Practice
2. Mandatory records: SOPs: colostrum management & calf
   feeding, health practices and branding, euthanasia, shipping cattle
3. Mandatory records: Cattle assessment / animal-based measures: BCS, hock, knee, and neck injuries, lameness

Question 30

Six attributes for locomotion scoring

Answer 30

1. head bob
2. asymmetric steps, reluctance to bear weight
3. spinal arch
4. tracking up
5. joint flexion
6. swinging in/out

Question 31

Assessing lameness in tiestall housing
In-stall lameness scoring method:

Answer 31

• Observe cows in their home stall
• If lying, make them stand but wait 5 min before scoring
• Watch the cow for 30 s, from behind
  > 10 s from their right, 10 s from directly behind, 10 s from their left
• Assess the presence of 4 control points
• If any 2 are present, a closer examination of the limbs is indicated

Question 32

Assessing lameness in tiestall housing
Control points to assess on each cow:

Answer 32

1. WEIGHT SHIFTING from side-to-side, between the left and right feet (front feet or back feet)
2. UNEVEN WEIGHT BEARING; repeated resting of one limb more than the other, opposite leg via a leg lift
3. STANDING ON THE STALL EDGE: to take the weight off affected claw
4. UNEVEN MOVEMENT when the cow is moved laterally, by the assessor, the animal shifts position in an uneven, irregular way

Question 33

Scoring tarsal (“hock”) injuries

Answer 33

acceptable: no swelling or minor swelling (<1cm); may have some hair loss, broken hair, or bald area

unacceptable: medium or major swelling and/or lesion

Question 34

Scoring carpal (“knee”) injuries

Answer 34

acceptable: no swelling; may have some hair loss, broken hair, or bald area

unacceptable: broken skin or scab, lesion and/or swelling

Question 35

scoring neck injuries

Answer 35

0: no swelling. no hair is missing, some hair loss or broken hair
1: no swelling. bald area visible
2. Injured. Broken skin or scab and /or swelling. may have bald area.

Question 36

Housing indoors and increased # of human-animal interactions generally results in _______ for dairy cattle

Answer 36

Housingindoorsandincreased#ofhuman-animal interactions generally results in more behaviour and welfare issues for dairy cattle (compare: beef)

Question 37

Dairy sector has been a leader in Canada by requiring farmers be _____

Answer 37

regularly subject to, and pass an “Animal Care Assessment”