Tail-in-mouth Behaviour Among Weaner Pigs in Relation to Age, Gender and Group Composition Regarding Gender

Schrøder-petersen, D. L.

doi:10.1080/09064700300512

Cited by 10 publications

(16 citation statements)

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“…This concurs with work by Ruiterkamp (1985;as cited in Van de Weerd et al, 2006) who reported that the amount of tail-in-mouth behaviour was sometimes higher in groups without outbreaks of tail biting. This contrasts with the theory that non-damaging contact with tails is a pre-cursor to tail biting (van Putten, 1969;Sambraus, 1985;Fraser, 1987;Schrøder-Petersen et al, 2003). Previous studies of tail biting have used this non-damaging behaviour as the outcome indicator of tail biting in the absence of real outbreaks (e.g.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 89%

“…Previous studies of tail biting have used this non-damaging behaviour as the outcome indicator of tail biting in the absence of real outbreaks (e.g. Schrøder-Petersen et al, 2003;Beattie et al, 2005) and this might be misleading. Our study suggests that further work is needed to confirm the nature of the relationship between these early non-damaging behaviours and severe tail biting before this assumption can be made.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…If tail biting develops from non-damaging tail-investigation as previously suggested (van Putten, 1969;Sambraus, 1985;Fraser, 1987;Schrøder-Petersen et al, 2003), tailorientated behaviours would be likely to be higher in groups which later develop outbreaks, or might become more prevalent before any damage was seen. Fewer curled tails might also be observed, as tails held down (McGlone et al, 1990) and tucked under the body (Bracke, pers.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 91%

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Predicting tail-biting from behaviour of pigs prior to outbreaks

Statham

Green

Bichard

et al. 2009

Applied Animal Behaviour Science

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-Predicting that an outbreak of tail biting is going to occur in a group of pigs would be a useful tool for farmers. In a prospective longitudinal study, 24 groups of c.30 undocked pigs were followed from birth to slaughter weight. Four groups had to be excluded from the analysis, the remaining groups were classified as having No Outbreak (n=6), Underlying Outbreak (n=8) or Severe Outbreak (n=6) of tail biting. The hypotheses examined were that pigs would be more active, perform more tail-orientated behaviours, or have their tails tucked under their body more in groups that went on to have outbreaks than in those that did not. Direct observations were made at 7, 11, 15 and 19 weeks of age and video recordings were examined for the 4 days prior to an outbreak. All outbreaks occurred after the behavioural observation at 2 11 weeks of age. Activity levels were significantly higher in Severe Outbreak groups in the four days prior to an outbreak, with more pigs Standing (p<0.05) and significantly fewer pigs Sitting (p<0.05) or Lying Inactive (p<0.05) than in matched control groups. Comparisons of the Severe, Underlying and No Outbreak groups at 7 and 11 weeks of age, prior to any outbreaks, showed no difference in activity levels. However, at these ages, levels of Tail

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 89%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 91%

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Predicting tail-biting from behaviour of pigs prior to outbreaks

Statham

Green

Bichard

et al. 2009

Applied Animal Behaviour Science

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“…Tail biting has been described as a predisposing factor for osteomyelitis in pigs (Walker and Bilkei 2006;Martinez et al 2007;Heinonen et al 2010). This behaviour had been largely studied as an indicator of reduced animal welfare although it may be influenced by several external and internal factors such as environment, feeding, housing, male-to-female ratio, genetics, sex or age (Schroder-Petersen et al 2003;Brunberg et al 2011). According to our study, the condemnations caused by osteomyelitis decreased after 2009.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Causes and factors related to pig carcass condemnation

García‐Díez¹,

Coelho²

2014

Vet. Med.

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Ante mortem and post mortem carcass condemnation records could be of use as a potential database for the study of swine diseases, epidemiology or animal welfare. Thus, the aim of this study was to investigate the causes of ante mortem rejections and post mortem carcass condemnation of pigs intended for human consumption during a 78-month period. The records considered for study were, date of slaughter, total pigs slaughtered and total number of ante mortem rejections (deaths during transportation and deaths in the pens) and post mortem carcass condemnations (osteomyelitis, caseous lymphadenitis, erysipelas, cachexia, pale, soft and exudative meat (PSE), bloody meat, muscular necrosis, purulent nephritis, purulent metritis, jaundice, meats from febrile pigs and peritonitis). The influence of several factors such as year, season, mandatory fulfilment of a food chain information form (FCIf ) and compulsory certification of swine drivers/transporters on ante mortem rejections and post mortem carcass condemnation was also studied. A total of 161 001 pigs slaughtered resulted in 238 (0.15%) ante mortem deaths, 160 763 pigs processed for meat consumption (99.7%) and 392 (0.24%) carcass condemnations. The ante mortem rejections revealed that 146 pigs (61.3%) died during transportation whereas 92 (38.7%) were rejected due to death in pens. The main causes of carcass condemnations were osteomyelitis (38.5%), granulomatous lymphadenitis (22.7%) and pleurisy/pneumonia (21.2%). A relationship was found between the month and ante mortem condemnations (P < 0.01), death losses during transport (P < 0.01) and between compulsory certification of animal transporters and deaths by transportation (P < 0.05). During the cold season, the probability of ante mortem rejections (OR = 1.84; CI 95%: 1.32-2.59) and death in pens (OR = 1.62; CI 95%: 1.02-2.57) was higher. The compulsory fulfilment of a food chain information form was not revealed to be significantly linked with the total number of carcass condemnations although the odds of ante mortem rejections were higher (OR = 2.10; CI 95%: 1.44-3.08) when it was not mandatory. Higher post mortem condemnations compared to ante mortem condemnations can be explained by the fact that several post mortem findings are asymptomatic in live animals. A progressive decrease in losses during transport was associated with on-farm improvements in animal welfare measures in addition with compulsory training of animal transporters. However, the consistent values of deaths in pens throughout the study period, with an increase during the winter, indicate a need for an improvement in the thermal conditions of the holding area in slaughterhouse. Regarding the post mortem condemnations, the improvement in animal welfare conditions may explain the decrease in osteomyelitis condemnations while the environmental origin of granulomatous lymphadenitis may be associated with region, climate or with the presence of hosts that may explain the influence of the time of year on its variations. The FCIf was i...

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“…Tail biting is an adverse behaviour characterised by the manipulation of a pig's tail by another pig resulting in tail damage of varying severity (Penny et al, 1981;Sambraus, 1985;Schrøder-Petersen et al, 2003). The underlying causes of tail biting are multi-factorial (Van Putten, 1969;Bracke et al, 2004a and2004b) and the likelihood of its expression is influenced by external factors, such as environmental enrichment, housing system, climate, stocking density and feeding management, as well as internal factors, such as breed, gender and age (Schrøder-Petersen and Simonsen, 2001).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Individual piglets’ contribution to the development of tail biting

Zonderland

Kemp

Bracke

et al. 2011

Animal

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Conflicting hypotheses exist about the contribution of individual pigs to the development of a tail-biting outbreak, but there is limited quantitative information to support or dismiss them. This study aims to quantify the development of tail-biting behaviour at pen and individual piglet level, before and after the first visible tail damage. Video recordings of 14 pens with tail-biting outbreaks and individually marked weaned piglets were used to observe tail-biting incidents (TBIs; piglet biting a penmate's tail). When visible tail damage was first observed in a pen (i.e. day of tail biting outbreak; D 0 ), the video recordings of the previous 6 (till D 26 ) and the following 6 days (till D 6 ) were analysed every other day for TBIs and the identities of the biter and bitten piglet were recorded. The average TBIs per individual piglet (within each pen) per observation day were analysed to quantify the development of tail-biting behaviour and to identify pronounced biters and/or bitten piglets. The (absence of) coherence for TBIs in a pen was used to test whether biters preferred a specific penmate. There was an exponential increase in the intensity (linear on log scale) of the TBIs from an average of 0.7 bites/h at D 26 to 2.3 bites/h at D 6 . An additional negative quadratic component suggests that a plateau for tail-biting behaviour was reached by the end of the observation period. Before any visible tail damage was observed (i.e. before D 0 ), 82% of the piglets performed and 96% of them received tail bites. After D 0 , the figures were 99% and 100%, respectively. One or a few pronounced biters could be identified in almost all pens. These biters already showed more tail biting at D 26 than their penmates. Furthermore, these biters showed a greater increase in tail-biting behaviour during the observation period than the average scores of their penmates. In contrast, there was no apparent increase in the receipt of bites among the piglets that had already been bitten more than their penmates at D 26 . Finally, there was no significant coherence between biters and bitten piglets, indicating that biters showed no preference for biting particular penmates, even when some of them had a damaged tail. These results show that, by using observations of TBIs, possible biters or bitten piglets can already be identified 6 days before tail damage is first apparent in a pen.

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Tail-in-mouth Behaviour Among Weaner Pigs in Relation to Age, Gender and Group Composition Regarding Gender

Cited by 10 publications

References 0 publications

Predicting tail-biting from behaviour of pigs prior to outbreaks

Predicting tail-biting from behaviour of pigs prior to outbreaks

Causes and factors related to pig carcass condemnation

Individual piglets’ contribution to the development of tail biting

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