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New maternity pen to improve cow welfare

Researchers at Aarhus University in collaboration with the company Jyden Bur will develop a self-operated maternity pen. The idea is to take advantage of the cow's natural tendency to seek isolation from the herd before calving. This has the potential to improve animal welfare, because the cow can calve undisturbed whereby the risk of calving difficulties and complications is reduced. This may also reduce labour and costs for the farmer.

[Translate to English:] I et nyt projekt på Aarhus Universitet skal forskere i samarbejde med virksomheden Jyden Bur udvikle et koncept med selvbetjente kælvningsbokse, der understøtter koens naturlige tendens til at søge isolation fra flokken før kælvning. Det kan give bedre sundhed hos koen og reducere omkostningerne i form af tabt mælkeydelse og dyrlægebehandling. Foto Jesper Rais, AU Foto

Fewer cows suffering from production diseases and fewer veterinary costs; those are some of the expected effects of a new research project, which is to be launched in the autumn of 2014 at the Department of Animal Science at Aarhus University. In collaboration with Jyden Bur, the researchers aim to develop a concept including self-operated maternity pens, which will accommodate the cow's natural tendency to isolate from the herd prior to calving.

 

- The idea is to develop a housing design, where the cow is able to withdraw from the herd during the early stage of calving, in order to calve alone in an undisturbed and clean maternity  pen, where she can stay with her new-born  during the first hours after calving , explains the project leader Margit Bak Jensen, who continues:

 

- The project investigates what a cow perceives as an optimal calving site with a sufficient level of isolation. Further, the project investigates the pre-requisites for the cow to be able to operate the maternity pen’s  gate, which ensures that she remains alone within the pen. The concept will be developed based on this knowledge.

 

In order to ensure an undisturbed calving, and to prevent infections, New Danish law states  that calving must  take place in an individual maternity pen, and that the cow and calf must spent the first hours after calving together . It is however, difficult to predict the time of calving, and many cows are either moved too late, or calve in the group pen  with other cows. This may result in poor animal welfare, due to prolonged calving and increased pain, as well as increased risk of dystocia, , metritis and calf mortality.

 

Considering this, Margit Bak Jensen foresees positive effects of implementing the project's concept:

 

- The concept has the potential to improve animal welfare and health, and to reduce expenses due to reduced milk production and veterinary treatment. Fewer cows with production diseases will also result in a lower environmental impact per unit milk produced. On top of that labour may be reduced by implementing our concept, estimates Margit Bak Jensen.

 

The project will identify which features of a sheltered area that stimulate isolation seeking prior to calving. This will be investigated by housing pregnant close-up cows in experimental pens, where they can choose between various calving areas. Differently shaped pen walls enclose the different calving areas in order to determine which enclosure is the most attractive.

 

Subsequently a self-closing gate will be developed and tested. A pre-requisite of the concept is that only one cow at a time may access the self-operated maternity pen, and that the cow and the calf can remain alone and undisturbed within it during the hours after the calving.

 

Once the calving pen and gate have been designed and developed, the aim is to investigate how much experience with these individual maternity pens and their self-operated gate is a prerequisite for the cow’s isolation seeking prior to calving. Furthermore, it will be investigated at which stage the cow seeks isolation in relation to the time of calving, and whether all cows calve in the individual maternity pens.

 

Finally, the project's partners will test the concept in a dairy herd. This test involves one group of cows calving in the new housing concept and a control group calving in traditional calving pens (at least 75 cows in each of the two systems). The effect on the occurrence of calving difficulties, production diseases, calf mortality and health as well as milk yield will be investigated. Furthermore, the level of labour in the two systems will be compared.

Further information: Senior researcher Margit Bak Jensen, Department of Animal Science, Telephone: +45 8715 7941, e-mail: Margitbak.jensen@agrsci.dk

 

Facts:

The project “The self-guided cow. Development of a concept with self-served maternity pens” has just received financial support from the Green Development and Demonstration Programme of the Danish Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Fisheries.

 

The project runs from 1 October 2014 to the end of 2017.