Welfare Assessment

Positive welfare for fishes: Rationale and areas for future study

Traditional animal welfare paradigms have focused on maintaining physical health and mitigating negative impacts to wellbeing. Recently, however, the field has increasingly recognized the importance of positive welfare (i.e., mental and physical states that exceed what is necessary for immediate...

Year Published: 2019Topics: Emotion, Pain, & Sentience, Welfare AssessmentAnimal Type: Fish, Other Fish, Salmon, Tilapia, Trout, Zebrafish

Citation: Fife-Cook, I., Franks, B. 2019. Positive welfare for fishes: Rationale and areas for future study. Fishes 4(2), 31.

Determining overweight and underweight with a new weight‐for‐height index in captive group‐housed macaques

Housing primates in naturalistic groups provides social benefits relative to solitary housing. However, food intake may vary across individuals, possibly resulting in overweight and underweight individuals. Information on relative adiposity (the amount of fat tissue relative to body weight) is...

Year Published: 2019Topics: Welfare AssessmentAnimal Type: Macaque, Nonhuman Primate

Citation: Sterck, E. H. M., Zijlmans, D. G. M., de Vries, H., et al. 2019. Determining overweight and underweight with a new weight‐for‐height index in captive group‐housed macaques. American Journal of Primatology 81(6), e22996.

Development of a welfare assessment protocol for dairy calves from birth through to weaning

The aim of this study was to develop a welfare assessment protocol using different indicators, for pre-weaned dairy calves, that is feasible and time efficient. To this end, the protocol had to combine animal-based indicators (measurements on physiology, general appearance...

Year Published: 2019Topics: Welfare AssessmentAnimal Type: Cattle

Citation: Barry, J., Kennedy, E., Sayers, R. et al. 2019. Development of a welfare assessment protocol for dairy calves from birth through to weaning. Animal Welfare 28(3), 331-344.

A systematic review of the potential uses of on-animal sensors to monitor the welfare of sheep evaluated using the Five Domains Model as a framework

This systematic review explores the use of on-animal sensors in sheep and their potential application in objective welfare monitoring. The key questions posed were: To what extent can current scientific knowledge inform a sensor-based approach to welfare evaluations? And, how...

Year Published: 2019Topics: External Bodily Equipment, Welfare AssessmentAnimal Type: Sheep

Citation: Fogarty, E. S., Swain, D. L., Cronin, G. M. et al. 2019. A systematic review of the potential uses of on-animal sensors to monitor the welfare of sheep evaluated using the Five Domains Model as a framework. Animal Welfare 28(4), 407-420.

Prevalence and severity of tail lesions as a possible welfare indicator for rabbit does

The impact of behavioural disorders on animal welfare in modern animal husbandry has been much debated. While other abnormal behaviours have been explored at length, there are a paucity of studies on tail-biting in rabbits (Oryctolagus cuniculus). In the present...

Year Published: 2019Topics: Abnormal/Problematic Behavior, Social Housing & Companionship, Welfare AssessmentAnimal Type: Rabbit

Citation: Bill, J., Rauterberg, S. L., Stracke, J. et al. 2019. Prevalence and severity of tail lesions as a possible welfare indicator for rabbit does. Animal Welfare 28(4), 511-518.

Complexities of using wild versus captive activity budget comparisons for assessing captive primate welfare

Activity budget comparisons between groups or individuals in the wild and those in captivity are commonly used to determine the range of wild-type behaviors that nonhuman animals in captivity perform. These comparisons are conducted with the view that individuals displaying...

Year Published: 2019Topics: Welfare AssessmentAnimal Type: Baboon, Capuchin, Chimpanzee, Lemur, Macaque, Marmoset, Nonhuman Primate, Other Nonhuman Primate, Owl Monkey, Squirrel Monkey, Vervet (African Green Monkey)

Citation: Howell, C. P., Cheyne, S. M. 2019. Complexities of using wild versus captive activity budget comparisons for assessing captive primate welfare. Journal of Applied Animal Welfare Science 22(1), 78-96.

Refinement of analgesia following thoracotomy and experimental myocardial infarction using the Mouse Grimace Scale

What is the central question of this study? There is an ethical imperative to optimize analgesia protocols for laboratory animals, but this is impeded by our inability to recognize pain reliably. We examined whether the Mouse Grimace Scale (MGS) provides...

Year Published: 2015Topics: Disease/Experimental Model, Welfare AssessmentAnimal Type: Mouse, Rodent

Citation: Faller, K. M., McAndrew, D. J., Schneider, J. E. et al. 2015. Refinement of analgesia following thoracotomy and experimental myocardial infarction using the Mouse Grimace Scale. Experimental Physiology 100(2), 164-172.

Welfare of Cultured and Experimental Fishes

This open access book is a printed edition of the Special Issue on Welfare of Cultured and Experimental Fishes that was published in the journal Fishes. The PDF is free for download.

Year Published: 2019Topics: Environmental Enrichment, Husbandry & Management, Social Housing & Companionship, Welfare AssessmentAnimal Type: Fish, Other Fish, Salmon, Tilapia, Trout, Zebrafish

Citation: Arechavala-Lopez, P., Saraiva, J. L. 2019. Welfare of Cultured and Experimental Fishes. Basel, Switzerland: MDPI, 132 pages.

Assessing the welfare of kennelled dogs—A review of animal-based measures

Hundreds of thousands of dogs are housed in kennels worldwide, yet there are no standard protocols for assessing the welfare of dogs in these environments. Animal science is focusing increasingly on the importance of animal-based measures for determining welfare states,...

Year Published: 2019Topics: Welfare AssessmentAnimal Type: Dog

Citation: Polgár, Z., Blackwell, E. J., Rooney, N. J. 2019. Assessing the welfare of kennelled dogs—A review of animal-based measures. Applied Animal Behaviour Science 213, 1-13.

A novel emotional and cognitive approach to welfare phenotyping in rainbow trout exposed to poor water quality

Recent scientific evidence for fish sentience has stressed the need for novel sentience-based detection tools of fish welfare impairment in commercial farms. In order to mimic a well-characterised stress situation, rainbow trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss) were exposed to poor water quality...

Year Published: 2019Topics: Human-Animal Interaction, Welfare AssessmentAnimal Type: Fish, Trout

Citation: Colson, V., Mure, A., Valotaire, C. et al. 2019. A novel emotional and cognitive approach to welfare phenotyping in rainbow trout exposed to poor water quality. Applied Animal Behaviour Science 210, 103-112.