Obtaining an animal welfare status in Norwegian dairy herds—A mountain to climb

Frontiers in Veterinary Science

Veterinary Science

Kristian Ellingsen-Dalskau¹  Camilla Kielland²  Conor Barry²  Christoph Winckler³  Stine Grønmo Kischel⁴  Randi Therese Garmo⁴ 

[1]Department for Animal Health, Animal Welfare and Food Safety, Norwegian Veterinary Institute, Ås, Norway

[2]Department of Production Animal Clinical Sciences, Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Norwegian University of Life Sciences, Ås, Norway

[3]Department of Sustainable Agricultural Systems, Institute of Livestock Sciences, University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences, Vienna, Austria

[4]TINE SA, Oslo, Norway

关键词: animal welfare;    Welfare Quality;    dairy cattle;    loose-housed;    regional variation;    Scandinavia;    prevalence;    free-stall housing;   

DOI  :  10.3389/fvets.2023.1125860

 received in 2022-12-16, accepted in 2023-02-02,  发布年份 2023

来源: Frontiers

【 摘 要 】

IntroductionKnowing the national status of animal welfare, one can identify welfare problems and set a benchmark against which improvements can be compared. Such a status is potentially invaluable for tangible, sustained animal welfare improvement. The objective of this cross-sectional study was to report the status of animal welfare in Norwegian loose-housed dairy herds as assessed using the Welfare Quality® Assessment Protocol. Additionally, we investigated if the welfare status varied on a regional basis.MethodsIn total, 155 herds in eight of Norway's eleven counties were assessed by six trained Welfare Quality® assessors. This article presents the herd prevalences of common welfare issues in dairy production in Norway, as well as integrated welfare scores. To determine whether welfare status varied regionally in Norway, generalized linear modeling was used to estimate the mean welfare score for five regions in the four Welfare Quality® principles: A. Good feeding, B. Good housing, C. Good health, and D. Appropriate behavior. These estimated mean welfare scores and their 95% confidence intervals were subsequently assessed for significant variation.ResultsEncouraging findings included the low mean herd prevalence of ‘very lean' cows (3.0%) and the high proportion of cows (59.8%) which could be touched during avoidance distance testing, indicating a positive relationship between stockpeople and their cattle. Challenges affecting the welfare of Norwegian dairy cows were also identified. Of particular concern were issues related to the cows' environment such as prolonged times needed to complete lying down movements and integument alterations. No herd was completely free of changes to the integument and, on average, 77.9% of each herd were affected either mildly or severely. Animal welfare did not appear to vary much between the five regions assessed. Our investigation revealed significant regional variation between two regions (Trøndelag and Vestlandet North) in only the Welfare Quality® principle Good housing (p < 0.01).DiscussionThe almost complete absence of regional variation demonstrates that animal welfare status generally varies most at herd level. In conclusion, both welfare challenges and encouraging findings were identified in loose-housed Norwegian dairy herds. To improve animal welfare, herd-specific interventions are most likely to be effective in these herds.

【 授权许可】

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Copyright © 2023 Barry, Ellingsen-Dalskau, Garmo, Grønmo Kischel, Winckler and Kielland.