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A systematic review of the impact of housing on sow welfare during post-weaning and early pregnancy periods

Breeder animals are an important focus in farm animal welfare assessments as they typically live the longest lives and are at the greatest risk for suffering due to their longevity. For breeding pigs, the time between the end of lactation (post-weaning) and the implantation of embryos (early gestati...

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Autores principales: Chou, Jen-Yun, Parsons, Thomas D.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Frontiers Media S.A. 2022
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9446151/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36082213
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fvets.2022.903822
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author Chou, Jen-Yun
Parsons, Thomas D.
author_facet Chou, Jen-Yun
Parsons, Thomas D.
author_sort Chou, Jen-Yun
collection PubMed
description Breeder animals are an important focus in farm animal welfare assessments as they typically live the longest lives and are at the greatest risk for suffering due to their longevity. For breeding pigs, the time between the end of lactation (post-weaning) and the implantation of embryos (early gestation) is very dynamic from both a physiological and husbandry perspective. However, research to date is limited on how best to house and manage sows during this critical period of their production cycle from a welfare perspective. Previous animal-based welfare outcome measures were restricted to certain health, behavioral and physiological indicators. This systematic review used Web of Science to make in-depth comparisons among welfare-based studies that focus on sow housing during the post-weaning and early pregnancy period to identify important knowledge gaps. Only a small number of studies (n = 27) were found that met our systematic search criteria. Compared to stalls, group housing requires mixing of animals and always triggers more aggression and skin lesions at the time of mixing. The predominant use of health and physiological indicators constrained the animal-based welfare outcomes in these studies. Thus, what type of housing yields the best overall welfare outcome remains to be elucidated as none of the studies found explored the mental wellbeing of sows during this period. This systematic review defines a critical knowledge gap regarding the full impact of housing on the welfare of post-weaning and early gestation sows. This gap, and thus the true welfare impact of sow housing, will only be addressed by the use of novel, more holistic assessment methods that also capture the psychological state of the sow.
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spelling pubmed-94461512022-09-07 A systematic review of the impact of housing on sow welfare during post-weaning and early pregnancy periods Chou, Jen-Yun Parsons, Thomas D. Front Vet Sci Veterinary Science Breeder animals are an important focus in farm animal welfare assessments as they typically live the longest lives and are at the greatest risk for suffering due to their longevity. For breeding pigs, the time between the end of lactation (post-weaning) and the implantation of embryos (early gestation) is very dynamic from both a physiological and husbandry perspective. However, research to date is limited on how best to house and manage sows during this critical period of their production cycle from a welfare perspective. Previous animal-based welfare outcome measures were restricted to certain health, behavioral and physiological indicators. This systematic review used Web of Science to make in-depth comparisons among welfare-based studies that focus on sow housing during the post-weaning and early pregnancy period to identify important knowledge gaps. Only a small number of studies (n = 27) were found that met our systematic search criteria. Compared to stalls, group housing requires mixing of animals and always triggers more aggression and skin lesions at the time of mixing. The predominant use of health and physiological indicators constrained the animal-based welfare outcomes in these studies. Thus, what type of housing yields the best overall welfare outcome remains to be elucidated as none of the studies found explored the mental wellbeing of sows during this period. This systematic review defines a critical knowledge gap regarding the full impact of housing on the welfare of post-weaning and early gestation sows. This gap, and thus the true welfare impact of sow housing, will only be addressed by the use of novel, more holistic assessment methods that also capture the psychological state of the sow. Frontiers Media S.A. 2022-08-23 /pmc/articles/PMC9446151/ /pubmed/36082213 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fvets.2022.903822 Text en Copyright © 2022 Chou and Parsons. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
spellingShingle Veterinary Science
Chou, Jen-Yun
Parsons, Thomas D.
A systematic review of the impact of housing on sow welfare during post-weaning and early pregnancy periods
title A systematic review of the impact of housing on sow welfare during post-weaning and early pregnancy periods
title_full A systematic review of the impact of housing on sow welfare during post-weaning and early pregnancy periods
title_fullStr A systematic review of the impact of housing on sow welfare during post-weaning and early pregnancy periods
title_full_unstemmed A systematic review of the impact of housing on sow welfare during post-weaning and early pregnancy periods
title_short A systematic review of the impact of housing on sow welfare during post-weaning and early pregnancy periods
title_sort systematic review of the impact of housing on sow welfare during post-weaning and early pregnancy periods
topic Veterinary Science
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9446151/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36082213
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fvets.2022.903822
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