Nociceptive Behavior and Physiology of Molluscs: Animal Welfare Implications

Economic implications of moving to improved standards of animal welfare

 replacing existing buildings and equipment with higher welfare systems often involves very large capital outlay costs. However, these costs will be much reduced if the change is delayed until the existing facility has reached the end of its working life;  where a producer is constructing a new building (rather than replacing an existing one) the capital costs entailed in selecting a higher w...

The implications of cognitive processes for animal welfare.

In general, codes that have been designed to safeguard the welfare of animals emphasize the importance of providing an environment that will ensure good health and a normal physiological and physical state, that is, they emphasize the animals' physical needs. If mental needs are mentioned, they are always relegated to secondary importance. The argument is put forward here that animal welfare is...

Physiology and Endocrinology: Animal Physiology

Initiation of lactation and newborn piglet nursing ability are 2 factors that can influence preweaning mortality. We have developed the “immunocrit” that can assess both lactation initiation and neonatal piglet nursing ability based on the transfer of immunoglobulin G (IgG) from the sow to the piglet. To perform an immunocrit, 50 μL serum was mixed with 50 μL 40% ammonium sulfate, the mixture w...

Animal behavior and well-being symposium: Farm animal welfare assurance: science and application.

Public and consumer pressure for assurances that farm animals are raised humanely has led to a range of private and public animal welfare standards, and for methods to assess compliance with these standards. The standards usually claim to be science based, but even though researchers have developed measures of animal welfare and have tested the effects of housing and management variables on wel...

ANIMAL BEHAVIOR AND WELL-BEING SYMPOSIUM: Novel and multidisciplinary approaches to animal welfare.