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      • Record: found
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      Is Open Access

      Effects of Environmental Enrichment on Pig Welfare—A Review

      review-article
      Author(s): 1 , * , 2 , 3
      Publication date (Electronic):
      Journal: Animals : an Open Access Journal from MDPI
      Publisher: MDPI
      Keywords: enrichment, pigs, welfare

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          Abstract

          Simple Summary

          The legislation regarding pig housing systems states that environmental enrichment needs to be provided for group-housed pigs. Moreover, the materials used for improving animal housing are categorised as optimal, suboptimal, and of marginal interest. Straw has been considered as the optimal solution for pig housing, however there are some limitations in using it in a large amount. Therefore, other materials, objects, and toys have been used as enrichment in pig maintenance. Understanding how various enrichments influence animal welfare seems to be an important key to elaborating the best methods of improvement. This review presents new literature references regarding environmental enrichment for suckling piglets, weaning piglets, and fattening pigs.

          Abstract

          Good husbandry conditions on farms is of key importance for assuring animal welfare. One of the most important legal documents regulating the rules of maintaining pigs is the Directive 2008/120/EC, which states that group-housed pigs should have access to litter or other materials that provide exploration and occupation. Released in 2016, the Commission Recommendation (EU) 2016/336 on the application of the Council Directive 2008/120/EC characterizes the various categories of materials that may be used to improve animal welfare. According to the document, straw is considered as an optimal material for pig housing, however, materials categorized as suboptimal (e.g., wood bark) and materials of marginal interest (e.g., plastic toys) are often used in practice and scientific research. As such, the aim of this paper is to review and systematize the current state of knowledge on the topic of the impact of environmental enrichment on pig welfare. This article raises mainly issues, such as the effectiveness of the use of various enrichment on the reduction of undesirable behavior—tail biting; aggression; and stereotypies at the pre-weaning, post-weaning, and fattening stage of pig production.

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          Stereotypies: a critical review

          Georgia J. Mason (1991)
          Article 0 comments Cited 183 times – based on 0 reviews     Review now
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            Relations among posttraumatic stress disorder, comorbid major depression, and HPA function: a systematic review and meta-analysis.

            Matthew Morris, Bruce Compas, Judy Garber (2012)
            Exposure to traumatic stress is associated with increased risk for posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and alterations of hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenocortical (HPA) function. Research linking traumatic stress with HPA function in PTSD has been inconsistent, however, in part due to (a) the inclusion of trauma-exposed individuals without PTSD (TE) in control groups and (b) a failure to consider comorbid major depressive disorder (MDD) and moderating variables. This meta-analysis of 47 studies (123 effect sizes, N=6008 individuals) revealed that daily cortisol output was lower for PTSD (d=-.36, SE=.15, p=.008) and PTSD+MDD (d=-.65, SE=.25, p=.008) groups relative to no trauma controls (NTC); TE and NTC groups did not differ significantly from each other. Afternoon/evening cortisol was lower in TE (d=-.25, SE=.09, p=.007) and PTSD (d=-.27, SE=.12, p=.021) groups and higher in PTSD+MDD groups (d=.49, SE=.24, p=.041) relative to NTC. Post-DST cortisol levels were lower in PTSD (d=-.40, SE=.12, p<.001), PTSD+MDD (d=-.65, SE=.14, p<.001), and TE groups (d=-.53, SE=.14, p<.001) relative to NTC. HPA effect sizes were moderated by age, sex, time since index event, and developmental timing of trauma exposure. These findings suggest that enhanced HPA feedback function may be a marker of trauma-exposure rather than a specific mechanism of vulnerability for PTSD, whereas lower daily cortisol output may be associated with PTSD in particular. Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
            Article 0 comments Cited 122 times – based on 0 reviews     Review now
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              Indicators of positive and negative emotions and emotional contagion in pigs.

              Elizabeth Bolhuis, T. Rodenburg, Inonge Reimert … (2013)
              For the welfare of group-housed animals, such as pigs, the emotional state of an individual pig is relevant, but also the extent to which pen mates are affected by the distress or pleasure of other individuals, i.e. emotional contagion, a simple form of empathy. Therefore, indicators of positive and negative emotions were investigated in pigs during anticipation and experience of a rewarding (access in pairs to a compartment with straw, peat and chocolate raisins) or aversive (social isolation combined with negative, unpredictable interventions) event. Thereafter the same indicators were investigated in naive pigs during anticipation and experience of a rewarding or aversive event by their trained pen mates. Positive emotions could be indicated by play, barks and tail movements, while negative emotions could be indicated by freezing, defecating, urinating, escape attempts, high-pitched vocalizations (screams, squeals or grunt-squeals), tail low, ears back and ear movements. Salivary cortisol measurements supported these behavioral observations. During anticipation of the aversive event, naive pigs tended to show more tail low. During the aversive event, naive pigs tended to defecate more, while they played more during the rewarding event. These results suggest that pigs might be sensitive to emotional contagion, which could have implications for the welfare of group-housed pigs. Pig emotions and the process of emotional contagion merit, therefore, further research. Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
              Article 0 comments Cited 94 times – based on 0 reviews     Review now
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                Author and article information

                Journal
                Journal ID (nlm-ta): Animals (Basel)
                Journal ID (iso-abbrev): Animals (Basel)
                Journal ID (publisher-id): animals
                Title: Animals : an Open Access Journal from MDPI
                Publisher: MDPI
                ISSN (Electronic): 2076-2615
                Publication date (Electronic): 22 June 2019
                Publication date Collection: June 2019
                Volume: 9
                Issue: 6
                Electronic Location Identifier: 383
                Affiliations
                [1 ]Department of Production Systems and Environment, National Research Institute of Animal Production, 32-083 Balice n. Kraków, Poland
                [2 ]Department of Swine and Small Animal Breeding, Faculty of Animal Sciences, University of Agriculture in Krakow, 30-059 Kraków, Poland; j.nowicki@ 123456ur.krakow.pl
                [3 ]Department of Rural Building, Faculty of Environmental Engineering and Land Surveying, University of Agriculture in Krakow, 30-059 Kraków, Poland; p.herbut@ 123456ur.krakow.pl
                Author notes
                [* ]Correspondence: dgodyn80@ 123456gmail.com
                Author information
                https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3803-2270
                https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0454-9151
                https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2399-0118
                Article
                Publisher ID: animals-09-00383
                DOI: 10.3390/ani9060383
                PMC ID: 6616547
                PubMed ID: 31234475
                SO-VID: f0aa2779-941d-4a1b-9ff2-8ca585cc97ab
                Copyright © © 2019 by the authors.
                License:

                Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license ( http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).

                History
                Date received : 24 April 2019
                Date accepted : 19 June 2019
                Categories
                Subject: Review

                Keywords: enrichment,pigs,welfare
                Data availability:
                Keywords: enrichment, pigs, welfare

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