ANSC*2210: Midterm

science

The effects of humans on the animal from the animal’s perspective.

ethics

The human actions towards the animal.

All of our beliefs (faith, philosophy), our culture, religion, etc.

law (codes of practice)

The result of science and ethics dictating how humans must treat animals.

basis of welfare definition

Three criteria for various definitions:

1. Physical: to ensure good physical health and functioning of animals.

2. Mental: to minimize unpleasant “affective states” (pain, fear, etc.) and to allow animals normal pleasures.

3. Naturalness: to allow animals to develop and live in ways that are “natural” for the species.

An animal’s welfare status is objective, but our struggle to measure it is subjective.

clinical signs / behavioural responses / subjective experiences

The intersection between physical and mental criteria in animal welfare.

Past positive and negative experiences inform the animal’s responses/changes in behavior/clinical signs → animals learn about the world.

• Clinical disease

• Injury

For example, associative learning: veterinarians/animal caretakers seen as…

1. Fearful stimulus (negative expectations).

2. Rewarding/positive stimulus (positive expectations, can be manipulated to improve animal welfare).

Conditions may affect the physical or mental state or both.

physical

One of the three criteria often used for animal welfare definitions. Covers basic health and functioning.

• Early tumors

• Early infections

mental

One of the three criteria often used for animal welfare definitions.

Refers to affective states (e.g. fear). Involves sensory input and past affective experiences.

Want to minimize negative mental states.

Welfare is dependent upon what animals feel. To be concerned about animal welfare is to be concerned with the subjective feelings of animals, particularly the unpleasant subjective feelings of suffering and pain.

current and future welfare

How may current conditions escalate/change in the future?

Example: malignant tumor in your dog’s mouth.

Current welfare:
- Physical status - abnormality
- Mental status - fine

Future welfare:
- Physical status - spread to lungs, etc.
- Mental status - pain, discomfort
- Suffering

laying hen

Hens (Gallus gallus) which have reached laying maturity and are kept for the production of eggs, which are intended to be for consumption instead of hatching. Around 6.6 billion worldwide.

• Egg numbers/hen day: 334

• Aviary system

• Laying period: ~18 until 70-100 weeks of age (depending on the country)

housing systems for laying hens

Cage (conventional or enriched) or non-cage systems (single- or multi-tiered).

By 2036, Canada will no longer house hens in conventional cages.

conventional cages

Ensure little to no enrichment for laying hens, they are prone to stereotypes.

furnished/enriched cages for laying hens

• Wire enclosure with extra space and elements:

  • Perches: 15 cm/hen

  • Nestbox (closed nest area)

  • Litter area: scratching + pecking is possible

  • Extra height: 45 cm

  • Food trough: 12 cm/hen

  • At least 2 nipple/cup drinkers

  • Claw-shortening device

• Variety of group sizes:

  • 0-12 birds = small group

  • 15-30 birds = medium group

  • ~60 birds = large group

• 750 cm² of cage area per hen; no cage less than 2000 cm²

550 cm²/hen in conventional cages

Conventional cage capacity that is banned in the European Union (EU).

indoor, single-tier non-cage system for laying hens

“Free-run” housing system for hens that include perches, a slatted floor area, an egg-laying area, and enrichment. Has space for animals to scratch and forage (expressing species-specific behaviours).

multi-tier systems (aviary systems) for laying hens

“Free-run” housing system with multiple levels for hens (perches). Puts birds at greater risk for keel bone fractures but provides more space for movement and expressing species-specific behaviours.

• Integrated or non-integrated nest boxes.

• Several levels of perforated floors with manure belts directly below them.

• Feeders and drinkers are distributed in such a way that all hens have equal access.

• Lots of natural light (windows), so similar to outdoors - adds to “natural” feeling.

free-run laying hen housing system

Hens housed indoors without cages. Can be single-tiered or multi-tiered. Some have patio access to the outside (protected by roof, “enclosure”).

range access

• Covered verandas/wintergarden: concrete floor, usually covered with litter, interior climate is similar to that of the outside aside from rain.

• Outside: covered with free draining material to maintain good hygiene both outside and within the house.

“natural living”

The third criteria upon which animal welfare is defined. Defined as “naturalness” - but what is natural behaviour? Are these behaviour patterns even beneficial?

Involves both physical and psychological advantages and disadvantages. Proportional to behaviour AND physiology.

Allow animals to develop and live in ways and environments that allow species-specific behaviour and behaviour that they are motivated to perform.

We have seen natural living (freedom to perform behavioural patterns) conditions (semi-natural environments) and major welfare problems.

natural behaviour/environment for pigs/sows

How do we go about describing animals’ “natural” behaviour when they have been living with humans for thousands of years?

housing female pigs: individual confinement

Sows can sit, lay down, or stand up. They may be able to walk a few steps back and forth. However, they do not have enough room to turn around. Also makes sure that piglets are not crushed by sow (separate resting area).

Allows producers to have control over feed intake and disease transmission. However, the pigs are locked in this confinement for 4 months. They cannot move to avoid manure/wet regions/aggressive neighbors.

Sows have very little autonomy/control over their own situations; leads to distress and aggression. They perform abnormal behaviours in this type of confinement.

Includes: gestation stalls and farrowing crates (for lactation sows - sows with piglets).

Canadian pig farming industry Code of Practice

Being updated for pig care and handling, aiming for full group housing of sows by 2029, while maintaining the 2014 code until the update is completed.

use of stalls throughout a sow’s pregnancy in the EU

Sow housing system that has been prohibited in the EU since 2013.

unnatural behaviour

Unnatural housing and abnormal behaviour lead to societal concern and scrutiny.

excessive drinking

Behaviour in sows in individual confinement that may arise as a consequence of feed restriction (pig compensates by drinking). This behaviour is seen as “unnatural”.

dog sitting

Behaviour in sows in individual confinement that may arise as a consequence of lameness, illness, and poorly managed confinement. This behaviour is seen as “unnatural”.

sham chewing

Behaviour in sows in individual confinement that may arise from an inability to perform foraging behaviours in their environment. This behaviour is seen as “unnatural”.

domestic pigs

Descended from the wild boar, omniverous forest dwellers. Spend most of their active time foraging. Very social animals.

Dr. David Wood-Gush (1922-1991)

One of the pioneers of animal welfare. Worked with pigs and chickens; established the “Edinburgh Pig Park” to examine the benefits of free range pork. Interested in the “natural behaviour” of domesticated pigs.

Dr. Konrad Lorenz (1903-1989)

Austrian zoologist, ethologist, and ornithologist. Shared the 1973 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with Nikolaas Tinbergen and Karl von Frisch.

One of the pioneers of the study of ethology, inspiring generations.

Very famous with respect to imprinting in animals → worked with wild animals, discovered that wild goslings will follow the first large moving thing they see.

ethology

The science of animal behavior.

Edinburgh “Pig Park”

A study conducted by David Wood-Gush and Alex Stolba in the late 70s/early 80s on the behaviour of domestic pigs in a semi-natural environment.

• How do these pigs behave in comparison to their wild ancestors?

• Environment: a forest modified by human, lots of natural features.

Results: Domestication left much of the behaviour of the wild ancestor largely intact, behaviour patterns seemed to have changed in quantity.

• Pigs prefer to live in stable groups:

  • Under commercial conditions, pigs are moved around over and over again → big stressor!

• If they have a choice, pigs like to be clean.

• Normally, pigs only display small amounts of aggression, whereas in commercial production, aggression is a big problem.

• Pigs like to spend up to 80% of their time foraging (rooting and searching for food).

  • Two phases: searching for food (keeps them busy) → eating food.

foraging in domestic pigs

Wood-Gush and Stolba found that pigs like to spend up to 80% of their time rooting and searching for food.

• Powerful neck muscles → snout that serves both as a shovel and as a delicate sensory organ with respect to feeding behaviours → rooting in the soil.

In commercial environments, pigs cannot root, so they resort to bar-biting and sham-chewing.

Family Pen System for Pig Production

Follow-up to Edinburgh Pig Park. This new accommodation included:

• Manure area

• Rooting area

• Activity area

• Nesting area

• Individual sow feeding stalls

Welfare problems:

• High neonatal death rates by commercial standards due to injury (sow crushing) or exposure (cold weather).

  • Additional stressors/factors affect the physical state of the animal.

• High labour requirements, lack of control over breeding/weaning, etc.

  • Very difficult to manage (especially hygienically).

emergency behaviour

Included in the freedom to perform natural behaviour:

Flight reactions bring the animal into a state of stress without achieving the goal for which the behaviour has evolved.

• e.g. running into walls.

This behaviour does not necessarily have a positive contribution to the welfare of the animals.

damaging behaviours

Included in the freedom to perform natural behaviour:

Such as rank-related or illness-related aggression.

This behaviour does not necessarily have a positive contribution to the welfare of the animals.

performance of natural / species-specific behaviour

Requires lots of flexibility and variability; very individual at times.

• Allowing animals to behave freely in an environment with key natural features.

• Animals are highly motivated to perform certain species-specific behaviours.

• Allowing for animals to carry out their behavioural needs or species-specific behaviour.

• Natural behaviour involves patterns that are associated with positive affective states.

natural stressors

Natural environments also include stressors such as heat, cold, disease, and predators - all of which can impact welfare,

Animal have anatomical, physiological, behavioural, affective, and cognitive reactions and other adaptations to deal with these stressors.

However, if the stressor is too long and/or too strong, it can lead to to physical and/or psychological distress and death.

three welfare criteria in gestation stalls

Restricting sows to stalls…

• “Naturalness”:

  • Restriction of oral and social behaviour (rooting, roaming, socializing; they are highly motivated to perform these behaviours).

  • Deprived of the ability to perform species-related patterns such as building nests, foraging, etc.

• Physical:

  • Lack of exercise: risk of cardiovascular fitness and bone strength.

  • Mouth injuries from bar biting (short-term and long-term damage).

  • Gastric ulcers.

• Mental:

  • Little control over the environment (inability to avoid wet, cold lying area, aggressive neighbours, insects).

  • Leads to frustration? distress?

  • Feeling pain/discomfort from mouth injuries, gastric ulcers?

  • Apathy.

motivation

Is the animal willing to work for a goal? How far are they willing to go (pushing open a door, etc.) to obtain something?

• Many people define “natural living” as important for animal welfare.

• However, how do we define what these “natural” conditions are for domestic animals?

Suggestion: define it not in terms of their natural environment or natural behaviour, but rather as their living in an environment where they can perform the behavioural patterns for which they are motivated.

group housing indoors for sows

Alternative to individual confinement for female pigs.

• Feeding stalls/electronic feeders.

  • Con: competition at feeder and lost tags.

• Straw bedding: microclimate in deep straw → gut fill and occupation.

  • Less aggression → more adequate space.

  • Less vulva biting → avoiding feeding competition and providing bigger meals.

  • Fewer leg problems (less slipping is riding/fighting).

individual housing with reduced sow confinement

Alternative to individual confinement for female pigs.

• Short-term, then allow sow to roam around in pen.

• Group farrowing systems.

• Two-stage systems:

  • Using the crate for birth and early lactation and then allowing more freedom once piglets become established.

alternatives to individual confinement for female pigs

• Group housing indoors

• Individual housing with reduced sow confinement

• More labour intensive

The Five Freedoms

Has become a global framework → prevention of harms. Impossible to be achieved 100%, so attempt to minimize negative experiences.

1. Freedom from hunger and thirst.

   1. By ready access to fresh water and a diet which maintains full health and vigour.

2. Freedom from discomfort.

   1. By providing a suitable environment, including shelter and a comfortable laying area.

3. Freedom from pain, injury, and disease.

   1. By prevention or rapid diagnosis and treatment.

4. Freedom to express normal behaviour.

   1. By providing sufficient space, proper facilities, and company of animal’s own kind.

5. Freedom from fear and distress.

   1. By ensuring conditions which avoid mental suffering.

why is there a focus on “the negatives”?

Intensification, modernization, confinement, automatization, technology.

Humans: Industrial Revolution in the 18th and 19th century (e.g. Occupational Safety and Health Legislation = prevention of harms).

Animals: “Animal Machines” by Ruth Harrison (1960s) revealed the harm industrialized agriculture inflicted on farm animals. Brambell inquiry (1965) was Britain’s first animal welfare legislation (1968) and focused on preventing harm.

focus on negative affect/states

Negative emotions lead to a single, clear, strong action tendency. For example, FEAR is linked to the urge to escape, ANGER with the urge to attack, DISGUST with the urge to expel…

• Allows animals to take advantage of new opportunities.

• Helps animals to respond immediately to negative stimuli.

Action tendancies and physiological changes go hand-in-hand (e.g. fear-AND-escape).

Behaviours that helped early humans out of life-or-death situations.

Observed health effects of prolonged negative emotions contribute to the impression that negative emotions are more significant.

The Five Freedoms: fantastic first step - now what?

Five Freedoms conflict

Freedom from disease confliccts with fear from handling during treatment.

Freedom to express normal behaviour conflicts with distress during normal social interactions.

Must try to minimize negative affective states!

loose housing with free stalls

In Germany, a common way of housing dairy cattle.

Twice a day or more, the cows will enter a milking parlour. Bedded stalls are provided for the cows to lie down. Barn aisles are non-slip cement or slatted floors.

Cows have free choice feed/transponder tag that identifies them when they access feed.

• Freedom of movement but not 100% as some areas are blocked off.

stanchion barns (“tie stalls”)

Housing system for dairy cows that has little possibility for exercise.

• Tied cows have little freedom of movement.

• The feed is provided to them in a manger which is in front of the stall.

• The laying area is approximately 5-15 cm raised above the stall floor.

• A drinker is available in the front of the stall.

• Behind the cows is a dung plate or a swallow channel for collecting the feces and urine.

• Next to that is the service passage used by the stockman for milking the cows (if it is still done on the stand).

• The service passage is also used for cow observations and hygiene control.

farming systems

All forms restrict normal behaviour to some extent.

Example: grazing cow → feeding and food-seeking behaviours.

• Grazing occupies a large amount of time (~8-9 hours per day); cow moves slowly across pasture with muzzle close to ground, biting and tearing off grass, swallow without much chewing.

• Ruminating when resting, time dedicated to ruminating is ~3/4 of that spent in grazing.

• When grazing, will constantly move forward as they do not naturally move backwards.

• Fences and housing restrict normal ranging behaviour.

quality of life

Jeremy Bentham

English philosopher who stated, “The question is not, ‘Can they reason?’ nor ‘Can they talk"?’ but rather, ‘Can they suffer?’”.

Realized that animals can suffer → primary expectation: animals should not suffer.

Emphasis on avoidance of negative experiences.

positive animal welfare concepts

Scientific interest started in the early 2000s - focused on positive affective experiences. This shift was driven by knowing that achieving good/acceptable animal welfare requires more than just avoiding negative experiences - we must provide positive/pleasurable factors/experiences.

Go BEYOND the Five Freedoms!

• Opportunities for positive affective engagement with the environment.

• Quality of life.

• Positive emotions.

• Happiness.

a good life

A life with mainly positive experiences and emotions.

a life worth living

A life with minimal suffering.

a life not worth living

A life with all suffering.

good welfare

Welfare that actively goes beyond the Five Freedoms and works to provide a life full of positive experiences.

Should be a main aim of husbandry with disease controlled, … normal behaviour, availability of environmental choices (animals are provided choices) and harmless wants, a ban on most (if not all) mutilations, certain husbandry practices, … opportunities for an animal’s comfort, pleasure, interest and confidence, and the highest standards of stockmanship has to be provided.

adequate welfare

Welfare with fewer negative experiences and some positive experiences.

poor welfare

Welfare in which animals experience mostly negative affective states and constant suffering.

Duncan

“… neither health nor lack of stress nor fitness is necessary and/or sufficient to conclude that an animal has good welfare. Welfare is dependent upon what animals feel.”

Dawkins

“… To be concerned about animal welfare is to be concerned with the subjective feelings of animals, particularly the unpleasant subjective feelings of suffering and pain.”

emotional expression in animals

An abundance of neuroscience evidence indicates that whereas the cognitive aspects of emotions, such as the recognition of happy and sad faces, require neocortical processing, the experiential states of happiness and sadness, as well as the other basic affective states are strongly dependent on sub-neocortical limbic circuitries that we share with the other mammals.

1999: Treaty of Amsterdam

Protocol on the Protection and welfare of animals: for the first time in EU law, animals were regarded as being which have feelings, can suffer, and experience well-being.

2009: Treaty of Lisbon

Article 13: Since animals are sentient beings, pay full regard to the welfare requirements of animals.

welfare continuum: quality of life

Acknowledges that animal welfare is MORE than JUST SURVIVAL:

• Animal care should be directed at more than survival.

• Animals can and, given the opportunity, do have positive experiences.

• An overall positive experience is possible.

• Minimal animal welfare standards/legislation should be reviewed/aimed to include validated enrichments.

benefits associated with positive animal welfare concepts

• Raising the animal welfare bars - animal welfare is of huge social concern.

• Changing human behaviour towards animals - how WE treat animals.

• Filling biological knowledge gaps:

  • Biology and behaviour

  • e.g. Differences between birds and mammals

• Economic benefits:

  • Enrichment-induced disease resistance, etc.

affect

The underlying experience of feeling, emotion, attachment, or mood.

neural activity

Potential evidence for affective states in animals.

behavioural neuroscience (Gray and Rolls) and cognitive neuroscience (Damasio)

Schools of thought that reject affective considerations in favor of behaviour and/or cognition-only approaches.

• Reject the notion that animals have subjective experiences.

• “Animals exhibit emotional behaviours, while humans have emotional feelings”.

affective neuroscience (Darwin, MacLean, Panksepp)

School of thought that suggests that animals are affective creatures. Supports the idea that animals have basal/auto-emotional systems → similar behaviour patterns.

“Animals experience emotional, sensory, and homeostatic (needs of the body) affects, … emotional responses emanate from specific subcortical brain systems that are homologous across species. Arousals of homologous sites in the human brain evoke affective feelings that are commensurate with the instinctual emotional actions evoked in other animals".

emotional systems

Systems that are dedicated to different emotions, found in sub-cortical areas. Strong biological evidence for these systems in animals.

1. General + Motivation SEEKING/Expectancy

2. RAGE/Anger

3. FEAR/Anxiety

4. LUST/Sxuality

5. CARE/Nurturance

6. PANIC/Separation

7. PLAY/Joy

emotions

Multicomponent response tendencies - incorporating muscle tension, hormone release, facial expression…, and cognition, among other changes - that unfold over a short timespan.

Typically begin with an individual’s assessment of the personal meaning. Either conscious or unconscious, this appraisal process triggers a cascade of responses incorporating mental, physical, and subjective changes.

Usually about something personally meaningful, usually short-lived! Can be both positive and negative!

sensory pleasure

• Includes experiences such as satiation of hunger, thirst, and the remedying of unpleasant states (e.g. cold, pain, or excessive noise).

• Arises whenever a stimulus corrects an internal trouble (e.g. eating when hungry).

• Shares with emotions a pleasant subjective feeling and may include physiological changes, but an emotion also requires an appraisal of some stimulus or an assessment of meaning.

• EMOTION AND SENSATION CAN CO-OCCUR: a good meal satisfies hunger, and can also lead to feelings of contentment.

moods

Differ from emotions, in that emotions are about some personally meaningful circumstances (they have an object).

These are typically free-floating or objectless, and are more long-lasting. Not tied to something personally meaningful.

animal suffering

No universally accepted framework. The term indicates that the being feels pain (negative experiences), and that the negative experience follows one around for a long time.

Includes that negative feelings (fear, anxiety, pain, etc.) are prolonged, high intensity or both, however, there is no clear distinction when it begins.

May be likely when repeated poor handling subjects the animal to pain and the animal learns to fear the handler.

Used in three ways:

1. When we describe negative affect in animals.

2. To imply the conscious experience of negative affect.

3. To identify negative affect that is severe or prolonged.

All three uses are weak and should be avoided.

future research on animal suffering

Not only requires the assessment of negative affective states but also an assessment on how they interact + an assessment of an animal’s emotional health and their ability to cope with adversity.

death

Because welfare concerns the quality of an animals life, this is NOT a welfare concern in its own right. Said animals can no longer have experiences.

High rates in a group of animals indicates a welfare concern (animals collectively experiencing bad welfare).

May indicate poor management/disease or another factor which leads to many animals becoming diseased (experiencing bad welfare).

The manner in which this happens is important: should be instantaneous!

animal law

Standard of protection provided by a legislator. Protection of an important “good”. Might reflect how animals feel/behave.

laws

The field of law or a specific piece of legislation.

Fundamentally: social constructs. NOT rights. Can assign duties.

right

Ethically, something someone ought to be granted according to philosophical or spiritual beliefs. Something you get by being alive, essentially.

ethical right

A patient in a hospital expects to be treated with empathy and compassion by healthcare providers.

classification

The essence of law; reflects power structures and cultural biases.

Minister Humphry Primatt

Anglican minister that created one of the first pieces of writing that showed that animals can feel. Among the first to bring animal welfare to the attention of the general public in Europe.

Jeremy Bentham

English lawyer, philosopher, and social reformer. The first to point out animals should be afforded legal consideration because of their ability to suffer.

Richard Martin

Irish politician, animal rights campaigner, duellist. First successful person to introduce a law into parliament to prevent animal cruelty: The Cruel Treatment of Cattle Act (1882). The first to impose a monetary fine and imprisonment.

The Cruel Treatment of Cattle Act (1882)

The first contemporary anti-cruelty statute, created by Richard Martin. Made it illegal to […] wantonly and cruelly beat or ill-treat [any] horse, mare, etc.”.

wilful

“Every one who causes the occurrence of an event by doing an act or by omitting to do an act that it is his duty to do, knowing that the act or omission will probably cause the occurrence of the event […]”

• The accused is required to perform/refrain from performing an action.

• The accused knows that this (in)action will probably cause the event in question to occur.

Criminal Code of Canada

• Animals are property.

• Anthropocentric focus: how do people behave DOES NOT EQUAL how does the animal in question feel.

• Not meant to give animals certain rights → focus is never on animals, focus is on ACCUSED.

Enabling Act

Authorizes the making of federal regulations.

Acts = made by Parliament.

Regulations = can be delegated by Parliament to an agency or a Minister.

Health of Animals Act

Enabling act whose purpose is to protect Canadian livestock from contagious diseases.

Reportable Diseases Regulation

Lists all reportable diseases (e.g. HPAI must be reported to CFIA).

Health of Animals Regulation (HAR)

Areas covered:

• Disease control, quarantine, animal disposal

• Import and export of animals and animal products

• Transport and feeding during transport of live animals

  • Including which animals are fit for transport and maximum transport times without feed, water, and rest

Enforced by the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA).

Safe Food for Canadians Regulations (2018)

Division 7 “Meat Products and Food Animals” covers humane treatment and slaughter: minimize suffering at end of life (applies to any livestock plant with exceptions for religious slaughter).

welfare assessment I: behaviour

• To identify different methods of welfare assessment

• To learn how we know if performing a particular behaviour is important to animals

• To understand the role of motivation in behaviour

• To understand animal preference as well as the strength of motivation

anthropomorphism

The attribution of human characteristics and feelings to other animals. Starting point for considering what animals want/need in order to have a good life

• e.g. humans find surgeries painful (especially without anesthesia/analgesics → same to be true about animals

Essential to use science and other information when considering/evaluating animal welfare, not relying on this alone.

critical anthropomorphism

Using science and other information when considering/evaluating animal welfare, not relying on anthropomorphism alone.

folk psychology

What human psychology is founded on (e.g. natural interpretation of children’s behaviour given our robust knowledge of human children).

The ordinary, intuitive, or non-expert understanding, explanation, and rationalization of people's behaviors and mental states.

folk animal psychology

The kind of expertise that humans have when they spend a lot of time interacting with another species.

Farmers, zookeepers, vets, and pet owners develop a psychology that they use to understand, predict and better interact with the animals in their care.

Must be qualified with scientific evidence. We cannot rely on our gut feelings!

e.g. Ham the chimpanzee - many people interpret his “smile” as happiness, but in reality, it is an expression of extreme fear.

dignity of the animal

Introduction in legislation in Switzerland (CH) (2008).

The inherent worth of the animal that has to be taken into account when handling it. If any stress imposed on the animal cannot be justified by overriding interests, this constitutes a disregard (Article 3 of the Swiss Animal Welfare Act).

Ethical considerations → ethical treatments + respect.

Do we care about animals because of their inherent value? We must recognize that animals deserve respect beyond their welfare.

D

Canada’s international perception via World Animal Protection.

Quebec 2015

Domestic and captive wild animals are sentient.