Responses to novel situations of female and castrated male pigs with divergent social breeding values and different backtest classifications in barren and straw-enriched housing
The growth of a pig is not only affected by its own genes, but also by the genes of its pen mates. This indirect effect on a pig’s growth is represented as social breeding value (SBV) in a newly developed breeding model. It has been hypothesized that pigs could affect their pen mates’ growth through […]
Genetic analysis of the individual pig behaviour in backtests and human approach tests
The most recent development in pig production has focused increasingly on the well-being of the individual pig and animal-friendly housing conditions, i.e. the launch of the group housing of sows in the EU. In this regard, however, standard procedures which may be stressful to the animals and thus have an impact on their health and […]
Relationship between behavioural tests and agonistic interactions at different age levels in pigs
Fighting among pigs is a normal behavioural pattern to establish a stable rank order. Enhanced aggressive behaviour in pigs in groups lead to increasing stress and injuries especially in mixing situations used as a common procedure in modern pig production systems. In such systems, it is usually not possible to avoid re-housing with unacquainted conspecifics. […]
The backtest in pigs revisited—Inter-situational behaviour and animal classification
Since the introduction of the backtest for the early detection of coping strategies in piglets by Hessing in the 1990s, this behavioural test has been intensively investigated with ambiguous results. One possible explanation for this lack of consistency might be the different classification methods used in many studies, so the first aim of this research […]