ANIMAL WELFARE (Issues in Beef Cattle) Flashcards
3 approaches to address animal welfare:
- Basic health and functioning
- Natural living
- Affective states
Producers and vets approach to address animal welfare:
-often focus on basic health and functioning
-habituation, desensitization, lack of perspective on what consumers may consider a problem
*consumers often focus on the natural living and affective states
Consumer disconnection from production practices:
-focus groups with consumers who claim to be knowledgeable or interested in the topic of food production, most of them struggle to elaborate
*most concerning was their misconceptions of how cattle are raised
Misconceptions of how cattle are raised:
-quickly and cheaply
-pumped with hormones and antibiotics
Consumers concerns on production practices:
-43% had no concerns
-29% had animal welfare concerns
Folk conceptions of welfare: (what non-experts people identify as welfare problem)
-provision of choice
-longevity, killing of young animals
-wasteful death
-aesthetics of methods of killing
-aesthetics of the animal and their environment
-human kindness/Stockmanship
Provision of choice
-shade
-cafeteria-style diets
Wasteful death:
-mass depopulation
Aesthetics of methods of killing:
-effective stunning/bleeding
Aesthetics of the animal and their environment:
-stocking density
-transport
Welfare concern: live animal transportation:
-often the only time the general public sees the animals used in agriculture
-important public and trade concerns worldwide
-perceived to be one of the most stressful events
One of the most stressful events: live animal transportation:
-unfamiliar sounds
-unpredictable motions (start-stop, turns)
-temperature
-water and feed restriction
-handling during loading and unloading
-crowding, commingling
-issues related to cull cows (ex. lameness)
-etc.
Temperature: live animal transport:
-transport duration and ambient temperatures have a multiplicative effect on each other
-more of a problem during the summer when it’s hot
-if the temperature is low, the temperature of the animal is fine
Transport and loss of body weight:
-if -20C need to spend a lot of time on the truck to lose weight
-higher the temperature, the more likely to lose body weight
-add 1.56% of BW for feeder cattle, 2.6 for calves and 3.56 for cull cattle to any value on the figure
Animal health: downers from transport
-at 30C and below -20C increases the amount dead or downer
-more time on the truck also increased the lame, dead and downers (especially after 20-30hrs)
How often does cattle get transported when arrive at auction:
-fit, compromised, unfit
-over 98% animals were fit upon arrival
-amount of animal welfare compromised in transport maybe isn’t as bad as we think
*for provincial abattoir there was an increase in compromised animals
-federal abattoir had mostly fit animals
Compromised:
-may only be transported with special provisions for care
Unfit:
-may only be transported for veterinarian treatment or diagnosis
Effect of rest stop during long distance transport:
-now 36h before you need to stop
-no consistent effect on welfare indicators
-animals seemed fine no matter the rest time
>hard to replicate industry conditions?
Rested vs. unrested:
-few statistically significant differences between rested and unrested calves (NEFA and standing time)
Auction vs. ranch direct:
-few and inconsistent indicators of reduced welfare were observed
Conditioned vs. unconditioned:
-preconditioning was the main event that effects animal welfare during transport (ex. weaned and offered food and water before transport)
Unconditioned cattle:
Increased:
-fat breakdown
-inflammation
-muscle damage
-standing time (discomfort)
Decreased:
-stress
-fear
What can increase the incidence of stress-mediated disease (BRD)?
-closer proximity of other animals
-human infrastructure
-human handling