Influence of nest site on the behaviour of laying hens

Lentfer, T L; Gebhardt-Henrich, Sabine G.; Fröhlich, E; Borell, Eberhard von

doi:10.1016/j.applanim.2011.08.016

Cited by 25 publications

(13 citation statements)

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“…Laying hens have been shown to use nest boxes mostly in the morning, followed by the midday and evening [44] . Our results also agreed with previous findings that when evaluating the influence of nest site on the behavior of laying hens the main laying period for hens in commercial aviary systems was between 1 to 4 h after lights were turned on [45] . The concentration of hens in the nest box during the peak time may be explained by the phenomenon of gregarious nesting, also known as the preference for occupied nests [19,46] , attributing this behavior to the sense of protection [42] .…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 92%

Evaluation of nesting behavior of individual laying hens in an enriched colony housing by using RFID technology

Oliveira

Xin

Wang

et al. 2019

International Journal of Agricultural and Biological Engineering

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The US egg industry is progressively adopting alternative housing systems for laying hens. Provision of nesting places accommodates natural behaviors and may improve the welfare of the laying hen. However, some fundamental questions remain about nesting behaviors of hens under different housing conditions, which would impact system design and management. For instance, how long does a hen use nest per day for egg laying or nest exploration? How many hens nest simultaneously? In such schemes, information on hens' behavioral and production responses of hens remains relatively sparse. The primary objective of this work was to demonstrate that RFID technology can be used to continuously quantify dynamic nesting behaviors of individual laying hens in a 60-hen enriched colony housing (ECH). Results show that hens spent on average 63.7±1.4 min (mean±SE) in the nest box and made 23.4±0.7 nest visits during a 16 h daily light period. Time spent in and visits to the nest box during the 6 h laying period accounted for 56% and 45% of the light-period value, respectively. Maximum nest occupancy was 29.0%±0.4%. Three distinct phases of egg production in nest boxes were observed: initial (1.5 h), peak (3.2 h, egg laying rate of 0.24±0.01 eggs/min), and late (1.3 h). The majority (95.1%±0.6%) of the daily eggs were laid in the nest box. Considerable variations in nesting behavior among individual hens and day-to-day variations for a given hen were observed. The RFID system will enable researchers to examine the impacts of resource allocations on nesting behaviors of laying hens in alternative hen housing.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 92%

Evaluation of nesting behavior of individual laying hens in an enriched colony housing by using RFID technology

Oliveira

Xin

Wang

et al. 2019

International Journal of Agricultural and Biological Engineering

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“…Additionally, a digital video camera (Samsung, 115 SCC-C4305P) was installed above each pen providing a complete outside view of the nests. Videos of the 116 pens and inside the nests were taken for a 5 hour period after the lights were turned on once during the 6 Accepted to Applied Animal Behaviour Science, February 2014 their eggs within the first 5 hours of the day (Lentfer et al, 2011;Riber, 2010) and verified during both trials: 119 more than 95 % of eggs were laid by the time the lights had been on for 5 hours. 120…”

Section: Data Collection 107mentioning

confidence: 99%

Does nest size matter to laying hens?

Ringgenberg

Fröhlich

Harlander-Matauschek

et al. 2014

Applied Animal Behaviour Science

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13Laying hens in loose housing systems have access to group-nests which provide space for several hens at 14 a time to lay their eggs. They are thus rather large and the trend in the industry is to further increase the 15 size of these nests. Though practicality is important for the producer, group-nests should also cater to the 16 egg-laying behaviour of hens to promote good welfare. One of the factors playing a role in the 17 attractiveness of a nest is the amount of enclosure: hens prefer more enclosure when having a choice 18 between different nest types. The aim of this study was to investigate if hens prefer smaller group-nests to 19 lay their eggs given that they may seem more enclosed than larger nests. 20The relative preference of groups of laying hens for two nest sizes-0.43 m 2 vs. 0.86 m 2 -was tested in a 21 free-access choice test. The experiment was conducted in two consecutive trials with 100 hens each. They 22 were housed from 18 to 36 weeks of age in five groups of 20 animals and had access to two commercial 23 group-nests differing in internal size only. We counted eggs daily as a measure of nest preference. At 28 24 and 36 weeks of age, videos were taken of the pens and inside the nests on one day during the first 5 25 hours of lights-on. The nest videos were used to record the number of hens per nest and their behaviour 26 2 Accepted to Applied Animal Behaviour Science, February 2014 with a 10 min scan sampling interval. The pen videos were observed continuously to count the total number 27 of nest visits per nest and to calculate the duration of nest visits of five focal hens per pen. 28We found a relative preference for the small nest as more eggs, fewer nest visits per egg and longer nest 29 visit durations were recorded for that nest. In addition, more hens-including more sitting hens-were in the 30 small nests during the main egg-laying period, while the number of standing hens did not differ. These 31 observations indicate that even though both nests may have been explored to a similar extent, the hens 32 preferred the small nest for egg-laying. 33 Keywords 34Laying hens, nest size, group-nests, nest choice, preference test, animal welfare 35 36 3

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“…To assess the relative social status of individual hens, we used continuous recording and focal animal sampling for the first hour Table 1 Ethogram of behaviours recorded for individual hens (adapted from Cordiner and Savory, 2001;Lentfer et al, 2011;O'Connor et al, 2011;Struelens et al, 2005).…”

Section: Data Collectionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…To ensure a working system, attractive nests must be provided to avoid floor eggs and to improve animal welfare by allowing hens to perform highly motivated pre-laying behaviour (Cooper and Appleby, 1995;Duncan and Kite, 1989;Kruschwitz et al, 2008a). The attractiveness of a nest is influenced by various factors including physical characteristics such as amount of enclosure and floor type (Duncan and Kite, 1989;Kruschwitz et al, 2008b;Stämpfli et al, 2011), position (Huber-Eicher, 2004Lentfer et al, 2011;Riber and Nielsen, 2013) and presence of other hens (Riber, 2010(Riber, , 2012. Individual hen factors such as hormonal status, age, and social rank are likely to play a role as well.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 98%