Stracke Jenny, Volkmann Nina, May Franziska, Döhring Stefanie, Kemper Nicole, Spindler Birgit
Institute for Animal Hygiene, Animal Welfare and Animal Behavior, University of Veterinary Medicine Hannover, Foundation, Hannover, Germany.
Faculty of Agricultural Sciences and Landscape Architecture, Osnabrück University of Applied Sciences, Osnabrück, Germany.
Front Vet Sci. 2021 Jan 6;7:613516. doi: 10.3389/fvets.2020.613516. eCollection 2020.
Animal welfare is one of the most challenging issues in modern farm animal husbandry. Animal welfare indicators can be used to monitor welfare on farms or at slaughterhouses, with footpad dermatitis (FPD) being one of the most important indicators used in turkeys. Up to now, the severity of FPD has been measured by evaluating the size of altered lesions on the metatarsal pad of birds. However, such lesions are not only found on the metatarsal pads, but alterations can also occur on the digital pads of the animals, the latter is not included in the European standard scoring systems for turkeys so far. The aim of the present study was to give a detailed outline of alterations on the digital pads of turkeys and associate their occurrence to a standardly used five-point scoring system, which is based on alterations of the metatarsal pad only. Therefore, pictures of 500 feet of turkeys from 16 flocks at the end of the fattening phase were taken, using an automatic camera system. Based on these pictures, alterations on the digits were scored according to different parameters (lesions, swellings, and number of affected digits). Furthermore, detailed measurements were conducted using an imaging software. Results were compared with a standardly used five-point scoring system (standard FPD scoring system), based on the metatarsal pad as reference. Results provide no equivalence in occurrence and severity of alterations on the metatarsal pads compared to those found on the digits. Pathologic alterations on the digits were already present at standard FPD scoring level 0; no differentiation became obvious between the higher scoring levels 2-4. Strong correlations were found when comparing percentage of alterations of the standard FPD scoring system to those of a system including alterations on the digits and the metatarsal pad, using the total foot as a reference (r = 0.9, < 0.001). This was the first study conducting a detailed analysis of alterations on the digits of turkeys. In conclusion, results of this study show that including the evaluation of alterations on digits could refine the present FPD scoring system, especially when using FPD as an animal welfare indicator.
动物福利是现代农场畜牧业中最具挑战性的问题之一。动物福利指标可用于监测农场或屠宰场的福利状况，脚垫皮炎（FPD）是火鸡养殖中最重要的指标之一。到目前为止，FPD的严重程度是通过评估禽类跖骨垫上病变的大小来衡量的。然而，此类病变不仅出现在跖骨垫上，动物的趾垫也会出现病变，而后者目前尚未纳入欧洲火鸡标准评分系统。本研究的目的是详细描述火鸡趾垫的病变情况，并将其发生率与仅基于跖骨垫病变的标准五点评分系统相关联。因此，在育肥阶段结束时，使用自动摄像系统拍摄了来自16个鸡群的500只火鸡的足部照片。基于这些照片，根据不同参数（病变、肿胀和受影响趾的数量）对趾部病变进行评分。此外，还使用成像软件进行了详细测量。将结果与基于跖骨垫作为参考的标准五点评分系统（标准FPD评分系统）进行比较。结果表明，跖骨垫病变的发生率和严重程度与趾部病变不同。在标准FPD评分0级时，趾部就已出现病理改变；在较高的2 - 4级之间没有明显差异。以整个足部为参考，将标准FPD评分系统的病变百分比与包括趾部和跖骨垫病变的系统进行比较时，发现了很强的相关性（r = 0.9，< 0.001）。这是首次对火鸡趾部病变进行详细分析的研究。总之，本研究结果表明，纳入趾部病变评估可以完善当前的FPD评分系统，尤其是在将FPD用作动物福利指标时。
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