Showing papers in "Applied Animal Behaviour Science in 2007"

TL;DR: The scientific data that allows us to interpret the effects of disease, handling, transport, food deprivation, and slaughter technique on fish welfare are reviewed and caution should be taken when interpreting "abnormal" fish behaviour.

TL;DR: In this paper, the authors review many of the potential stressors that may adversely affect animals living in captivity and present a suite of behavioral or physiological responses that will clearly indicate the cause of those responses; rather, it is up to us as managers and caretakers of animals in captivity to evaluate enclosures and husbandry practices to ensure the optimal well-being of animals.

TL;DR: In this paper, the authors summarise recent findings on the causation of stereotypic behaviours and other abnormal repetitive behaviours (ARBs) in captive animals: primarily motivational frustration and/or brain dysfunction, with possible contributory roles also being played by habit-formation and "coping" effects.

TL;DR: Evidence from a number of studies indicating that problems with habitat selection behavior compromise conservation efforts is reviewed, and recommendations that may encourage animals to “feel more at home” in post-release habitats are provided.

TL;DR: In this paper, the motivation for exploration in pigs is elucidated and the needs of the pigs in this context are discussed, based on the literature on the normal behaviour of pigs and studies on pigs' use of and preferences for various materials, they conclude that in order to be a suitable rooting material the material must stimulate pigs for an extended length of time.

TL;DR: In this paper, a review examines the behavioral and physiological effects of the predictability of aversive and appetitive stimuli, and the application of experimental findings to animal husbandry in practice, and recommends modifications to husbandry routines that may be easy to incorporate into the schedules of busy staff yet could have a profound impact on the welfare of animals in their care.

TL;DR: In this paper, the authors focus on the consequences for fish welfare and the progress towards developing the means to pass and protect fish at hydropower dams, at water withdrawal facilities, and in other engineered aquatic environments.

TL;DR: In this article, the authors investigate the frequency of potentially problematic behaviours experienced by a convenience sample of companion dog owners and to establish if the presence of these behaviours was associated with demographic variables, involvement in dog training activities and participation in other dog-human interactions.

TL;DR: In this paper, the authors discuss three recently developed theoretical models that show how changes in social strategies are related to variations in group size, and explain how this leads to different predictions.

TL;DR: In this paper, the authors discuss the emotional consequences of coping with challenge, the association between lack of challenge and the development of abnormal behavior, and the benefits of stress in facilitating learning and memory of relevant skills.

TL;DR: It is demonstrated that a significant proportion of the variation in apparent welfare between captive carnivore species stems from specific aspects of natural behaviour, and enclosure designs and enrichments focussing on carnivores’ ranging tendencies could be particularly effective means of improving welfare.

TL;DR: It is concluded that there is no single optimal method to quantify anthropogenic stressors; method selection will depend on precise goals and fiscal constraints.

TL;DR: An overview of the major themes, problems, and opportunities in applied animal behavior related to conservation and welfare is provided, highlighting that many of the behavioral processes of interest to welfare science are also important for conservation behavior.

TL;DR: In this paper, the authors describe several well-studied principles from the field of experimental analysis of behavior, including intrinsic reinforcement, extrinsic reinforcement, habituation, extinction, and schedules of reinforcement that could be very useful for evaluating the short and long-term effectiveness of enrichment.

TL;DR: In this article, the authors examine existing catch-and-release research from a welfare perspective to determine the extent to which potential pain and suffering could be caused and identify strategies that anglers may adopt that minimize these effects through changes in either gear (e.g., type of hook, bait, or net) or angling practices.

TL;DR: Thinner cows spent less time eating, particularly when temperatures became colder, had lower minimum body temperatures, were more likely to spend time lying in postures that reduced surface area exposed to rain and wind, and had lower NEFA concentrations compared to high-conditioned cows, indicating that body condition helps insulate cows exposed to winter weather.

TL;DR: Social ecology in the wild is used as a starting point to understand experimental studies of these social species, and factors such as group composition and stability, rank and previous social experience need to be taken into account when designing housing systems.

TL;DR: The welfare of gestating sows housed in either large groups on deep litter (Hoops) or conventional stalls (Stalls) is measured and changes in some leucocyte sub-populations in the Stalls treatment late in gestation are measured.

TL;DR: The system of gait scoring and the measure of weight applied to each leg were both able to detect lame cows and were both sensitive to local anaesthetic, indicating some degree of validity.

TL;DR: In this paper, a food-rewarded learning system based on a combination of classical and operant conditioning for groups of domestic pigs using acoustic cues (call-feeding station) was developed.

TL;DR: Two experiments aimed at assessing how commercially available light sources at set illuminances influenced the behaviour of broiler chickens showed a fairly resilient time-budget across light sources and intensities, whereas age and time-of-day affected most behaviours recorded.

TL;DR: The results from this study show that the number of environmental enrichment studies has been steadily increasing from a low level in the 1980s until 1999, when there was a noticeable acceleration in thenumber of articles published, a response to the growing interest in environmental enrichment by neuroscientists.

TL;DR: In this article, a 13-item questionnaire assessing attention skills, impulsivity and motor activity in pet dogs was developed on the basis of a validated one used for evaluating ADHD related problems in children.

TL;DR: In this article, the authors investigated how characteristics of both the dog, Canis familiaris, and their owner influence the quality of life (QoL) of the pet dog.

TL;DR: The zoo environment provides an excellent arena for examining the development and expression of behavioral types and for taking a novel functional approach to environmental enrichment research that may prove to be very important to re-introduction efforts.

TL;DR: In this paper, the authors discuss the impact of group size on damaging behaviours, aggression, fear and stress in farm animals and identify housing-and management options that can help to reduce problems caused by suboptimal group sizes.

TL;DR: In this article, the authors evaluated the behavioral, cortisol and growth responses of pigs to a repeated social stress and found that pigs exhibited more agonistic behaviour than C pigs throughout the experiment.

TL;DR: A longitudinal study on the development of severe feather pecking in individual domestic fowl using behavioural data collected from 192 individual White Leghorn hens housed continuously from hatch in 16 floor pens finds a positive association between a factor describing foraging when young and severe featherpecking when adult and a negative association.

TL;DR: The effect of the pre-weaning housing system on play behavior before weaning and agonistic behavior after weaning was investigated in 32 litters of domestic pigs as discussed by the authors. But the results of the study were limited.

TL;DR: To clarify factors related to the aptitude of drug detection dogs and develop an assessment tool, genotypes and behavioural traits of 197 candidate dogs were evaluated and desire for work and distractibility were significant.