Department of Ethology, Institute of Animal Science, Přátelství 815, 104 00, Prague-Uhřínevěs, Czech Republic.
School of Biological Sciences, Institute for Global Food Security, Queen's University Belfast, 19 Chlorine Gardens, BT9 5DL, Belfast, Northern Ireland, UK.
Sci Rep. 2022 Aug 3;12(1):13348. doi: 10.1038/s41598-022-15919-8.
Most dairy calves are housed individually in early ontogeny but social housing has positive effects on calf welfare including an advantage of social buffering, i.e., when negative effects of stress are mitigated through social support of conspecific. The effects of social buffering has not yet been examined in relation to disbudding; a painful husbandry procedure commonly performed on young dairy calves. The objective of this study was to investigate the effect of pair versus individual housing on calves' behavioral reaction to disbudding. In total 52 female calves were randomly allocated either to individual (n = 16) or pair housing (n = 36, 18 focal). Calves were hot-iron disbudded with a local anesthetic and their spontaneous behavior in home pens was recorded for 24 h pre- and post-disbudding. Eating forage, ruminating, resting, exploration, play, self-grooming, and pain-related behaviors were quantified during eight 20 min intervals during the 24 h periods pre- as well as post-disbudding. In pair-housed (PAIR) calves social resting, active and passive allo-grooming were additionally recorded. The differences between individually housed (INDI, n = 10) and PAIR calves (n = 12) were tested by general linear models. The changes in pre- and post-disbudding behaviors in all calves as well as in social behaviors of PAIR calves were tested by paired t-test. We found that head shaking (t = - 3.46, P = 0.0024), head rubbing (t = 4.96, P < 0.0001) and self-grooming (t = 2.11, P = 0.04) increased in all calves after disbudding. Eating forage increased only in PAIR calves (t = 2.50, P = 0.030) which also resulted in a difference between treatments with PAIR calves fed more often than INDI calves (F = 12.96, P = 0.002). Differences in eating forage may be an indication of improved ability of PAIR calves to recover from disbudding. No other significant differences were detected between treatment groups which might have been caused by our limited sample. Our results provide the first evidence that housing treatment affects calves' reactions to disbudding, with possible indication of social buffering.
大多数奶牛犊牛在早期发育阶段被单独饲养，但社交饲养对犊牛福利有积极影响，包括社交缓冲的优势，即通过同物种的社会支持减轻应激的负面影响。社交缓冲的影响尚未与去角有关；这是一种常见的在年轻奶牛犊牛身上进行的痛苦的饲养程序。本研究的目的是调查对牛犊进行去角时，成对饲养与单独饲养对牛犊行为反应的影响。共有 52 头雌性犊牛被随机分配到单独饲养（n=16）或成对饲养（n=36，18 个焦点）。犊牛使用局部麻醉剂进行热铁去角，在去角前 24 小时和去角后记录其在家庭围栏中的自发行为。在去角前 24 小时的 8 个 20 分钟间隔内，量化了吃草、反刍、休息、探索、玩耍、自我梳理和与疼痛相关的行为。在成对饲养（PAIR）的犊牛中，还记录了社交休息、主动和被动的同种梳理。通过一般线性模型测试单独饲养（INDI，n=10）和 PAIR 犊牛（n=12）之间的差异。通过配对 t 检验测试所有犊牛去角前后行为的变化以及 PAIR 犊牛的社交行为的变化。我们发现，去角后所有犊牛的摇头（t=-3.46，P=0.0024）、摩擦头（t=4.96，P<0.0001）和自我梳理（t=2.11，P=0.04）增加。仅在 PAIR 犊牛中，吃草量增加（t=2.50，P=0.030），这也导致 PAIR 犊牛比 INDI 犊牛更频繁地进食，这两种处理之间存在差异（F=12.96，P=0.002）。在吃草方面的差异可能表明 PAIR 犊牛从去角中恢复的能力有所提高。在处理组之间没有发现其他显著差异，这可能是由于我们的样本有限。我们的结果首次提供了证据，表明饲养方式会影响犊牛对去角的反应，这可能表明存在社交缓冲。
