Development of pig welfare assessment protocol integrating animal-, environment-, and management-based measures

Abstract Background Due to increased interest in animal welfare, there is now a need for a comprehensive assessment protocol to be used in intensive pig farming systems. There are two current welfare assessment protocols for pigs: Welfare Quality® Assessment Protocols (applicable in the Europe Union), that mostly focuses on animal-based measures, and the Swine Welfare Assurance Program (applicable in the United States), that mostly focuses on management- and environment-based measures. In certain cases, however, animal-based measures might not be adequate for properly assessing pig welfare status. Similarly, welfare assessment that relies only on environment- and management-based measures might not represent the actual welfare status of pigs. Therefore, the objective of this paper was to develop a new welfare protocol by integrating animal-, environment-, and management-based measures. The background for selection of certain welfare criteria and modification of the scoring systems from existing welfare assessment protocols are described. Methods The developed pig welfare assessment protocol consists of 17 criteria that are related to four main principles of welfare (good feeding, good housing, good health, and appropriate behavior). Good feeding, good housing, and good health were assessed using a 3-point scale: 0 (good welfare), 1 (moderate welfare), and 2 (poor welfare). In certain cases, only a 2-point scale was used: 0 (certain condition is present) or 2 (certain condition is absent). Appropriate behavior was assessed by scan sampling of positive and negative social behaviors based on qualitative behavior assessment and human-animal relationship tests. Results Modification of the body condition score into a 3-point scale revealed pigs with a moderate body condition (score 1). Moreover, additional criteria such as feed quality confirmed that farms had moderate (score 1) or poor feed quality (score 2), especially those farms located in a high relative humidity region. Conclusions The developed protocol can be utilized to assess welfare status in an intensive pig farming system. Although further improvements are still needed, this study is a first step in developing a pig welfare assessment protocol that combines animal-, environment-, and management-based measures

Adaptation des truies gestantes en elevage intensif: mise au point d'un outil d'evaluation de terrain

National audienc

Adaptation des truies gestantes en elevage intensif : mise au point de criteres d'evaluation

National audienc

Adaptation des truies gestantes en elevage intensif : mise au point de criteres d'evaluation

National audienc

Adaptation des truies gestantes en elevage intensif: mise au point d'un outil d'evaluation de terrain

National audienc

Améliorer les performances et le bien être des truies gravides par la mobilisation de nouvelles technologies pour une alimentation de précision et la détection de signaux comportementaux.

Since the new welfare regulation, farmers have to breed pregnant sows penned in the group. Thus, breeders observed more heterogeneity in the backfat thickness of sows when they are entering the farrowing units, implying more losses of piglets. It is also more difficult to observe lameness issues in large groups of sows. The objectives of this project are (i) to develop an activity sensor to feed each sow according to the energy it spends and (ii) to create an early detection system for lameness problems. The first step of this project was to develop a sensor able to record the individual activity level of sows penned in a group. As a result, Acti’Sow has been created. It is an ear tag accelerometer offering to know the daily time spent lying, standing and walking by a sow with a global accuracy close to 85 %. This project offers a better knowledge about sow behavior thanks to automatic feeders, connected drinkers, weighing scale and activity sensors. On average, the daily water consumption is 8.2 l/day/sow, but this result hides a huge variability close to 50 % when comparing a sow to another and 38 % for the same sow from a day to the next one. About their activity, an average sow spends 67 % of its time lying down, a bit more than 28 % standing up without moving and less than 5% walking. According to that, between the laziest one and the more active one, energy expenditure represent more than 500 g offeed. It means, with the same fixed objective of backfat thickness with these two sows, a farmer will need to give 500 g more feed/day for the very active sow. Early warning system for lameness issues was the other main result of this study. Through the use of watering and feeding behavior (number of visits per day, time of each visit, quantity of water/feed consumed, access rank to the feeder), individual weight and activity level, we built a first model able to individually predict lameness issue 24 hours before the farmer can observe it. The accuracy is close to 77 %. It means, that a cell phone app can alert farmers when a sow needs to be checked.Depuis la mise en groupe des truies gestantes, les éleveurs observent plus d’hétérogénéité de l’état corporel des truies lors de leur entrée en maternité impliquant plus de pertes de porcelets. Il est également plus difficile d’observer les problèmes d’aplombs dans des grands groupes de truies. La première étape de ce projet avait pour objectif le développement d’un capteur capable d’enregistrer le niveau d’activité individuel des truies logées en groupe conformément à la réglementation bien-être. Cette étude a donc permis la mise au point de l’Acti’Sow. Il s’agit d’un accéléromètre autonome, positionné à l’oreille des truies, qui permet de connaître le temps quotidien passé par les truies à rester couchée, debout ou encore à marcher. Par ailleurs, cette étude offre également une meilleure connaissance du comportement des truies grâce aux nourrisseurs et aux abreuvoirs connectés, à la station de pesée identifiée et aux capteurs d’activité. En moyenne, la consommation d'eau quotidienne d’une truie est de 8,2 l / jour mais ce résultat cache une variabilité conséquente de près de 50% lorsque l'on compare une truie par rapport à une autre et de 38% pour la même truie d'un jour à l'autre. À propos de leur activité, une truie « normale » passe 67% de son temps en position couchée, un peu plus de 28% en position debout sans bouger et moins de 5% en marche. Sachant cela, entre la plus fainéante et la plus active, la dépense énergétique liée à cette activité représente plus de 500 g d’aliment. Le système d'alerte précoce des problèmes de boiterie est l'autre principal objectif de cette étude. En utilisant les comportements alimentaire et hydrique (nombre de visites par jour, heure de chaque visite, quantité d’eau / d’aliments consommée, rang d’accès au nourrisseur / abreuvoirs), le poids individuel et le niveau d’activité, nous avons construit un premier modèle capable de prédire individuellement les boiteries 24 heures avant que l’agriculteur puisse l’observer. La précision est proche de 77