Welfare Assessment in Calves Fattened According to the “Outdoor Veal Calf” Concept and in Conventional Veal Fattening Operations in Switzerland

Abstract

The “outdoor veal calf” system was developed to encounter the demand for a veal fattening system that allows for reducing antimicrobial use without impairing animal welfare. Management improvements including direct purchase, short transportation, vaccination, three-week quarantine in individual hutches, and open-air housing in small groups in a roofed, straw-bedded paddock with a group hutch were implemented in a prospective intervention study (1905 calves, 19 intervention and 19 control farms, over one year): antimicrobial use was five times lower in "outdoor veal" farms compared to control farms (p < 0.001), but it was crucial to ensure that antimicrobial treatment reduction was not associated with decreased animal welfare, i.e., that sick animals were not left untreated. Welfare was assessed monthly on the farms, and organs of 339 calves were examined after slaughter. Cough and nasal discharge were observed significantly (p ≤ 0.05) less often in intervention than in control farms, mortality (3.1% vs. 6.3%, p = 0.020) and lung lesion prevalence (26% vs. 46%, p < 0.001) were lower; no group difference was seen in abomasal lesion prevalence (65% vs. 72%). Thus, besides reduced antimicrobial use, calf health and welfare were improved in "outdoor veal calf" farms in comparison to traditional operations.

A Systematic Review on the Link between Animal Welfare and Antimicrobial Use in Captive Animals

“…Finally, organic and biologic systems, which are presumed to be welfare-friendly, had lower AMU when compared to conventional systems in many of the studies retained [46,47,49]. This was an expected result.…”

“…Two publications reported a positive effect of welfare-friendly labels on the AMU of fattening calves in Switzerland [47] and in Italy [48]. The former study found that the Swiss "outdoor veal calf" concept had an AMU five times lower when compared to control farms and further investigated whether this reduction was associated or not with "decreased animal welfare, i.e., that sick animals were not left untreated".…”

Welfare of calves

“…Therefore, BCS can be useful as an indirect indicator of health problems such as respiratory disorders. BCS has been used for many years in the management of dairy cows, while it only more recently has been used as a welfare indicator in veal calves (Wilson et al., 2000 ; Renaud et al., 2018 ; Deikun et al., 2020 ; Moser et al., 2020 ; Boyle and Mee, 2021 ); Welfare Quality®, 2009 . BCS was also used in a recent study organised by the New Zealand Government to identify reasons for mortality and morbidity in dairy calves sent for slaughter (so called ‘bobby calves’), and to identify new welfare indicators in these animals (MPI, 2018 ).…”

“…Housing type (e.g. igloo vs closed barn), including presence or absence of ventilation Whether the animal is reared indoors or has access to an outdoor run; total air volume and the degree of ventilation can have an impact on the prevalence of respiratory diseases (Moser et al, 2020) Humidity and temperature (temperature humidity index)…”

Associations of antimicrobial use with antimicrobial susceptibility at the calf level in bacteria isolated from the respiratory and digestive tracts of veal calves before slaughter

“…Data regarding antimicrobial treatments, production parameters, animal welfare and economics were collected during the visits. 3 , 12 , 13 The calves were fattened according to improved welfare standards (IP-SUISSE) alongside milk production in all farms. 14 Farmers worked according to one of two management concepts: the ‘outdoor veal calf’ or ‘conventional’ (19 farms each), as described previously.…”